A Traveller’s Nightmare

Humans never cease to amaze me!

Let’s say you manage an airport; oh, nothing fancy: four gates, 20 movements per day and two check-in counters.

A waiting lounge with a capacity of 150 passengers.

Pretty easy right? You simply make sure there is never more than 1 aircraft on the tarmac at any time. Ok, maybe two: they’re never completely full. Result: small(ish) queues and nearly everyone finds a place to park his/her butt (after all, most pax were picked up 2-3 hours before departure).

If you’re incompetent (or a sadist), you cluster your departures: 4 flights, then 2 hours of inactivity, then 4 flights, then 3 hours of inactivity, then another 4 flights….

Then you can watch all these people queuing outside the airport before reaching the (only operating) counter. You can also smirk as they all hang around a packed departure lounge, fighting for seats and oxygen (BTW, you’ll find the same gits who reserve their sunchairs at the poolside, piling odd bits of carry-on luggage onto available seats: you never know, Helmut might just decide to sit down after a while…).

But then, I suspect it is all a cunning strategy you make you actually enjoy the square meter of space allotted to you during your flight home.

I sure did!