‘Stampedes, long queues, fighting and no social distancing whatsoever’:
Passengers recount ‘worst travel experience ever’ at Delhi airport
Travel agents are advising people to hold off trips, as holiday rush and Omicron panic has resulted in a chaotic scenario at the airport
Niharika Lal
09.12.2021
The chaotic scenario and never-ending queues at Delhi airports have become a hot topic on social media recently, with netizens posting both concerned and tongue-incheek tweets, comparing the airport to a ‘train station’.
Mocking the Inception-like queue-within-a-queue-within-a-queue (you get the picture!) saga one has to face at the airport, comic Amit Tandon tweeted recently, “Lounge at Mumbai International Airport has a longer queue than the check in counter (sic)”. To this, someone replied – “can’t be longer than the line at Delhi airport to enter the airport”. At the same time, sharing a picture of the overcrowded Delhi airport, entrepreneur Kiran Mazumdar Shaw tweeted, “...Not A Train Station, This Is Delhi Airport Under Omicron Rules...it’s obvious that the airport testing upon arrival will cause pandemonium n a transmission hot spot - but who’s listening? (sic)”
DOMESTIC AIR TRAFFIC UP BY 0.5% DESPITE OMICRON: STUDY
India’s domestic air traffic went up by 0.5% recently, according to UK aviation data company OAG. In India, domestic airlines offered a total of 3.34 million seats last week, while this week the number was a tad higher at 3.36 million. In comparison, pre-Covid, in the first week of December 2019, domestic airlines offered a total of 3.5 million seats.
AIRPORT WAS CROWDED FOR TWO DAYS DUE TO NEW GUIDELINES, OPERATIONS ARE NOW SMOOTH, SAYS DELHI AIRPORT OFFICIAL
A Delhi airport official says, “While the airport was crowded for the initial two days after the guidelines were issued, operations are now smooth. People are also opting for RTPCR tests for which they can get results within 90 minutes and not miss their flight.” While talking about complaints regarding passengers’ temperatures not being checked, the officials said, “Body temperature is not checked at the airport because there is a mass thermal screening system installed to screen all passengers.” He adds, “We have also made provisions for separate parking for flights coming from high risk countries, so that they do not come in contact with other passengers.” Videh Kumar Jaipuriar, CEODIAL, said in a statement that apart from installing extra rapid RT-PCR machines and test counters, “We are also working closely with the immigration authorities to facilitate swift movement of passengers. Seating arrangements have been vastly expanded and food counters have been made available in the waiting area.”
A railway station is less crowded than the Delhi airport: Travellers
As per UK aviation data company OAG – domestic air traffic in India is up by 0.5% despite reports of rising Omicron cases. If anything, the newly detected COVID-19 variant has led to people preponing international travel plans, as those abroad scramble to find tickets to return home.
‘THERE WAS OVERCROWDING OUTSIDE THE AIRPORT, AT CHECK-IN, FOOD COUNTERS AND THE WAITING AREA’
A traveller who flew to London this week, described her airport experience as “quite chaotic”. “First, we had to wait in a queue for around 15-20 minutes to get inside. Once I entered the airport, it felt like the pandemic never happened! There was overcrowding at check-in queues, food counters and the waiting area. No one was following any social distancing, whatsoever,” she says.
The passenger adds, “I wouldn’t say it felt like a railway station, because I recently travelled by train and the station was definitely less crowded than the airport!” Another person, whose family flew to India, says they encountered a stampede-like situation at the airport and called it the “worst experience of their lives”.
On Monday, after pictures of long queues, chaos and crowd at the Delhi airport surfaced online, it was reported that aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia directed Delhi airport operator DIAL to implement better crowd management strategies.
‘PEOPLE WERE FIGHTING IN QUEUES TO GET THEIR COVID TEST RESULTS AT DELHI AIRPORT’
As revised travel guidelines were implemented in the wake of the new COVID variant, many flyers had to wait for hours to get their tests done and then wait for the results, which led to more crowding and chaos, say passengers. Aryaman Raj Sokhal, student of Cambridge University, who reached Delhi, last week, shares, “Before boarding my flight from Heathrow airport, I had to book an RT-PCR test on arrival, and had to choose a time slot. I was landing at 1.15am in Delhi, so I chose the 2-3am slot. On landing, I had to go to one desk to get a QR code, and then another for my COVID test. I was lucky to not find any queue at both places. However, after the test one has to wait for a PDF that is mailed to them, which can take up to 4-5 hours. After taking the print of the PDF, one has to get it stamped before they can proceed to immigration. The queue for the print out was long, and people were jumping it and fighting among themselves. It took me five hours to reach the luggage belt and finally leave the airport.”
‘IT WASN’T POSSIBLE TO MAINTAIN SOCIAL DISTANCING, PEOPLE WEREN’T EVEN WEARING MASKS’
Akshat, who works for a film production company and flew to Delhi this week from Mumbai, says, “It was one of my worst travel experiences. Flyers are panicking that we’ll go into lockdown any second, and so are desperate to reach their destination. At the same time, despite Omicron fears, flights are still serving food and operating at 100% occupancy. If you are lucky, then your flight’s air hostess may remind fellow passengers to wear a mask, but more often than not, people are being too careless about rules.”
Vidhur Dixit, who returned from London on December 6, adds, “I was scared after seeing the crowd at the Delhi airport. It just wasn’t possible to maintain social distancing and most people were not even wearing their masks properly.”
— with inputs from Divya Kaushik
MUMBAI, HYDERABAD AIRPORTS OFFER MOST EXPENSIVE RAPID TESTS
Under the new norms, passengers arriving from ‘at-risk’ nations have to undergo an RT-PCR test and wait for their results before they can leave the airport or take a connecting flight. They can choose between the regular and rapid versions of the test. At the Delhi airport, a rapid test costs a passenger ₹3,500, while results come in 60-90 minutes. A regular RT-PCR costs a passenger ₹500 and the results come in around six hours. Following are the prices of rapid tests in different cities:
Mumbai: ₹3,900
Hyderabad: ₹3900
Delhi: ₹3,500
Bengaluru: ₹3,000
Kolkata: ₹2,900
Chennai: ₹2,900
Cochin: ₹2,490
(Source: TOI)
BUDGET TRAVELLERS SHOULD AVOID AIRPORTS TRIPS RIGHT NOW, SAY TRAVEL AGENTS
Travel agents point out that they have been getting a lot of complaints from both, passengers flying out of the country and those flying in. Prachi, a travel agent says, “People are complaining about having to fill multiple forms on the flight and once they land at the airport, despite no one checking those forms. Some even told us that their temperature wasn’t checked at the airport. This includes not just Delhi, but all other major airports in the country. Families are facing more trouble than solo flyers, because test prices for them average at over ₹15,000. Passengers with connecting flights are facing a lot of trouble, too, because if they miss their next flight, who will compensate them?”
A senior staff member at a travel portal says, “We are advising people to hold off leisure travel plans for at least a week or ten days, as the current airport scenario is too chaotic. Budget travellers should avoid travelling at present.” Akash Rastogi, director of a travel company, adds that the current situation is more panic-induced.
