Yesterday I arrived at Heathrow Airport for one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life.
Trying to leave the country on a British Airways flight.
Shortly after, William and Kate, their children and the family’s dog began their vacation – crossing the backyard of Kensington Palace to board a privately chartered helicopter and be whisked away for a summer vacation.
No queues for them.
Jealous? Of course I am.
Air travel for the rest of us is a dramatically different experience.
The two-and-a-half weeks I survived in I’m a Celebrity were a breeze compared to the misery of two and a half hours of shuffling in a queue at Terminal 3 yesterday.
Traveling through Heathrow Airport is a form of torture.
The chaos, the queues, the tantrums, the lack of food and water, and the huge luggage pile hidden somewhere in the building have made headlines around the world.
And those scenes were mirrored all over the country as we entered the height of the holiday season – in Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham.
Instead of happy people excited at the prospect of a long-awaited break, we see downtrodden, crumpled, defeated souls. Forced step by step step by step towards their goal – the departure hall. Images are shown all over the world that put our travel industry to shame.
The two-and-a-half weeks I survived in I’m a Celebrity were a breeze compared to the misery of two and a half hours of shuffling in a queue at Terminal 3 yesterday
William and Kate, their children and the family’s dog began their holiday – crossing the backyard of Kensington Palace to jump on a privately chartered helicopter and be whisked away for a summer break. No queues for them
Are you coming to Great Britain? Don’t make me laugh – our largest airport looks like a tin destination in a fifth world dictatorship run by idiots who couldn’t organize a penguin queuing system.
The queues at Heathrow, along with the hidden thousands of unclaimed and lost bags, are terrible publicity for British tourism bosses trying to lure foreign visitors to Britain after the ravages of Covid.
And even worse for all the brave Brits hoping to go on long overdue vacations when schools break up for the summer.
As William and Kate sat back and enjoyed the view over Hyde Park, I looked at the back of the guy in front. My long march started two hundred meters from the outside of the terminal building, past the taxi drop-off points. Grim enough, but for a few unlucky people – brave enough to risk checking a piece of luggage – it was the second row of the morning.
Here’s my advice for anyone preparing to use a UK airport this summer.
Listen to a contemplative app on your phone, hoping it won’t run out of battery and your online boarding pass.
You will have to meditate to stop yelling insults at the bastards responsible for your misery.
It may be 30 degrees, but ration your precious bottle of water. Every lone traveler has to give orders to partially shut down his bodily functions. Toilet trips rely on the trust of a fellow traveler to save your lock.
When I finally made my way to Terminal 3, it was curiously empty.
Because it didn’t provide any service. No help. Only staff giving the order to line up outside.
Don’t hand out bottles of water.
Do not single out the elderly and put them in the foreground.
Saying sorry a lot.
My line of moms and dads, kids, babies and old people were amazingly good natured, stunned in silence by the horror of what they would have to do to accept or miss their vacation.
We meandered up and down the length of the terminal in a mindless route devised by a simpleton. Finally, we zigzagged to a small room where a single staff member led all the exhausted passengers up a SINGLE escalator to the first floor, while blocking all the others. There was no end in sight.
Upstairs, the queue was divided into ‘Fast Track’ and the rest, as far as the eye could see. The shops were closed.
Fast track.
What a joke.
As hilarious as ‘priority boarding’.
Or ‘service on board’.
On reaching security only two of the three machines were in operation, although the staff were quick, efficient and pleasant.
When I reached the room, I had to lie down in a darkened room with a wet washcloth over my eyes. Unfortunately, there was still some hanging around to board the plane, which involved a bus in 30 degrees. By the time I got to my overpriced seat, I needed intravenous gin, not a mini bag of nuts, and second-class mulled wine.
So, whose fault is this horrible situation?
And will things get worse next week when all the state schools break up?
The queues at Heathrow, along with the hidden thousands of unclaimed and lost bags, are terrible publicity for UK tourism bosses
The airline industry and our major airports have jumped from one crisis to another. They laid off too many staff during Covid to cut costs. They found it difficult to recruit and train new people, even though Grant Shapps tried (too late) to streamline the vetting process.
But it still takes three months to recruit, vet and train security personnel and baggage handlers. Heathrow, Gatwick and Manchester all say they have hired 400 to 500 new employees. If so, the results don’t seem clear.
Technical problems have devastated British Airways, with dozens of flights canceled around Easter and peak hours.
We, the passengers, are treated like stupid cattle that will end up in horrible lines and without facilities just because we are foolish enough to want to go on vacation by plane.
I had been hopelessly optimistic – I had switched and upgraded to business class, naively thinking that by buying a ticket that reads ‘priority boarding’ I could avoid the hours of trudging.
ha ha ha
Earlier this week, Heathrow’s boss said they are limiting the number of passengers passing through the building to 100,000 a day until September 11 and canceling flights to make up for queues and delays.
This has resulted in dozens of flights being canceled without warning, affecting the summer vacation plans of more than 91,000 people.
And it’s not going to get any better. Now the airport is begging airlines to STOP selling tickets as they have calculated that there are still 4,000 seats available per day, taking over their acceptable capacity.
In addition to the prospect of queuing, passengers now (like I did) have to wait anxiously 48 hours before flying to see if their flight will be cancelled. And so you arrive (with checked luggage) after a sleepless night, barely fit to start the marathon.
Willie Walsh (the former BA boss) says Heathrow was ‘wrong’ by failing to predict the increase in demand. Heathrow boss has apologized for his ‘difficult’ decision to cancel flights.
Manchester Airport boss says ‘don’t expect a great summer experience’.
Never mind great, my ‘experience’ was awful.
Only a mug would want to visit Britain right now.