Bristol Airport has issued an apology to passengers who experienced long waits this morning as reportedly only 'half of the security points' were open during peak times.
Following weeks of similar queues and delays at the airport, this morning saw yet more lengthy queues, with some passengers claiming that the queue for check-in and security was around 90 minutes. In one tweet, published at around 6:24am, one passenger also said that "only half of the security points" were open and that the staff on duty were having a "sh**** time dealing with the chaos".
In a statement from Bristol Airport, a spokesperson said: "We are sorry customers experienced an above average check-in and security queue this morning during peak operation (Sunday 22 May). We work closely with all business partners and airline handling agents to ensure staffing levels are sufficient to provide a good service and our average queue time for security is 30 minutes.
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"We constantly review resourcing across all areas and adapt plans to meet demand and build in resilience where possible to ensure that service standards are consistent through the day. We appreciate the frustration experienced by customers currently and please be reassured our teams are working exceptionally hard to assist customers throughout the airport journey.
"All business partners are continuing to recruit and train new colleagues, but this takes time. We advise all customers to check with the airline when their check-in/ bag drop desk opens and arrive in the terminal at this time – do not arrive too early as customers will not be able to check-in.”
From passengers' tweets, messages and comments it seems that the longest queues seem to be occurring in the morning. Just days ago Bristol Live reported that there had been more long queues caused by hold-ups at security, with pictures showing passengers queuing outside the airport just to check-in.
There has been a series of IT issues recently, in amongst the staff shortages the airport is facing. But the queues have all seemed to die down throughout the day - one traveller this week tweeted that it was "organised chaos" saying it was "very busy but well handled".
Bosses at Bristol Airport said they are working with airlines to sort out the ongoing issues of long queues at the check-in and security gates that are regularly frustrating passengers. The airport is advising people to check with their airline what time the check in or bag-drop desk opens, and arrive then - and not to arrive too early.
Bristol Airport has a large number of flights scheduled each day in the hour after 6am - and has been advising passengers they could need to arrive up to three hours before, to get through the various check-ins and security gates.
The issues have seen queues of people so long they stretch out of the terminal building and down the road this week.
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