[Courtesy of Incheon International Airport Corp.]
169 flights delayed, over 5,200 pieces of passengers’ luggage clogged up, and some airplanes left without luggage to their destination after endless waiting. Incheon International Airport Corp. (IIAC) had its worst day since the opening of the airport on Sunday.
The IIAC is getting blasted from both the public and the media for the mayhem it caused. But the company has its reasons. “A large number of passengers contributed to the luggage handling failure.” An IIAC official said. “Also, we were short of staffs who were dealing the luggage.”
On Sunday, a total of 176,432 people travelled through the airport, which is the largest number since its opening. With long holidays over Christmas and the New Year, a lot of people travelled overseas over the days but were bottlenecked on arrival, a day before the first working day of the year.
According to the official, the IIA is able to process a maximum of 12,600 pieces of luggage an hour, but on Sunday, only an average of 7,500 was processed. The official said it was due to luggage which were not of ordinary type.
Souvenirs wrapped in plastic, paper bags and other baggage which exceeded standard travelling bags’ sizes took more time for IIAC to process the luggage, causing it to bottleneck.
With all the chaos and mayhem in the airport experienced, a union of 67 airline companies which dwell in the IIA is considering in making a legal action against for damages IIA caused. A source from the union said, “We can understand the bottleneck situation and the system failure in luggage processing, but how the IIAC reacted, was to slow and not very efficient.”
Kang Ho-in, the Minister of Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport, also visited the IIA on Tuesday afternoon to receive reports about the chaos and demanded the IIAC to prevent any recurrences in the future.
아주경제 박세진 기자 = swatchsjp@ajunews.com
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
