Surprise and relief as airport chaos vanishes

SCENES of chaos and long queues of people in the early morning cold at Dublin Airport last weekend appeared to ease yesterday despite the huge volume of commuters on the move over the bank holiday weekend.

On one of the busiest weekends of the year, many passengers took to social media to praise staff and express relief for the short queues.

@caoimhew said: ‘Hats off to all of the @DublinAirport staff – did bag drop & went through security in under half an hour this morning. Expected chaos, but was very pleasantly surprised by how fast & efficient everything was.’

Around 50,000 passengers departed from Dublin Airport on Good Friday and a further 45,000 took to the skies yesterday.

Airport operator DAA continued to advise people to arrive threeand-a-half hours before their flights, but some complained they arrived unnecessarily early given the short queues.

DAA media relations manager Graeme McQueen said: ‘The aim for the past couple of weeks has been for everyone to make their flight. The flip side is that there are more people in the terminal for longer and it is busier air-side.’

He added staff redeployment has enabled them to keep queues at security under 30 minutes for all of the Easter weekend so far.

And he said 250 new staff have been employed in recent weeks.