Airports across the nation are facing an influx of Christmas travellers as many Australians begin their first end-of-year holiday period in three years without COVID restrictions.
Friday is expected to be the busiest day of the year for domestic air travel, but experts warn that this festive season the rush will last well into January.
“Normally, we would have expected today to be probably our busiest day of the summer,” Melbourne Airport spokesman Andrew Lund told radio 3AW.
“But we’re actually looking at January 6 being our busiest day, suggesting that a few people might have decided to wait to travel until after Christmas.”
With the great Christmas getaway well and truly swinging into gear on Friday, the message from airport management across Australia was clear – get organised and be patient.
Trade publication Australian Aviation reports that six million people were expected to pass through Melbourne airport terminals in December and January – a 150 per cent increase on Christmas 2021. Earlier this week, the airport said it had about 100,000 passengers a day in the lead-up to Christmas – although December 24 and Christmas Day were expected to be slightly quieter.
Passengers can expect delays when claiming baggage, with a spokeswoman for the airport saying staffing issues continued to affect wait times.
“With fewer staff that just creates a challenge of unloading the planes and getting it to passengers quickly,” she said.
“But we’ve been working with all of the airlines and their ground handling companies and they’ve been working to build back up their staffing.”
In Brisbane, three million people are expected to travel through the airport this holiday period, while Sydney will have 2.2 million passengers between December 12 and January 1 alone – up 82 per cent on the same period in 2019.
As the rush got underway on Friday, Sydney airport published a list of handy travel tips for holidaymakers on its website.
Melbourne Airport chief executive Lorie Argus told the Sydney Morning Herald staff numbers had been boosted in preparation for holiday surge – and to try to avoid a repeat of the delays and chaos that marred winter travel peaks.
“We have hundreds of new staff preparing to work their first Christmas holiday period at Melbourne Airport, which is exciting,” she said.
“At the same time, we’d ask passengers to be patient as the team works to get everyone and their belongings safely where they need to be over the summer holiday period.”
Tweet from @bellarozz
Christmas flights diverted as Melbourne fogs up
Friday’s gathering rush came after early delays in Melbourne when heavy morning fog sparked the diversion of four Victorian-bound international flights.
Two flights from Christchurch and one from Tokyo were diverted to Sydney on Friday morning.
Another from Denpasar landed in Adelaide.
The weather caused delays to both international and domestic flight schedules. The airport was expecting delays to continue throughout Friday.
“Flights are still landing, flights are still departing, it’s just a bit of a slower process because flights need to be escorted when you have low visibility conditions,” airport spokesperson Rebecca Arnold said.
Mr Lund said passengers should be patient.
“We can’t get the same number of aircraft on the runaways as we usually would, so [we’ve had] quite a few delays this morning, unfortunately,” he said.
He said airlines were doing “everything they can to get back on schedule”, but warned that delays could continue into the day.
Tweet from @Melair
Friday’s delays came after wild storms hit Melbourne on Thursday. Heavy rains during two storms just a few hours apart led to leaks and flooding in the airport buildings, and delays to numerous flights.
Crews were still clearing the resulting debris on Friday morning.
Australians bound for the UK told to expect delays
Travel chaos looms for Australians heading to the UK as airport Border Force workers go on strike from today until Monday, 26 December, over pay and conditions.
The industrial action will affect Heathrow, Gatwick, Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham and Cardiff airports.
While the strike lasts, all entry points into the country will be manned by soldiers and public servants who have received only four days of training.
Many people entering Britain may have to face extended delays, with the government warning travellers to be patient and to keep in touch with airlines about what to expect.
