Travellers have been warned to arrive early to Sydney Airport as chaos continues, with Thursday set to be the busiest day in two years.
After two years of uncertainty and interstate border closures due to the Covid-19 pandemic, 82,000 people are expected to pass through Sydney’s domestic terminals in just one day.
A stretched staffing system mixed with school holidays and the Easter period has led to mayhem at the airport, with customers having to wait hours to pass through check-in desks and security.
The last time foot traffic at the domestic terminals reached 80,000 people was March 6, 2020.
Wild scenes are expected to extend over the weekend with another 79,000 people set to file through the airport on Good Friday.
Numbers are expected to drop on Saturday and Sunday to around 60,000, before picking back up again on Monday.
There are also massive queues at Melbourne and Adelaide airports where similar chaos is unfolding on Thursday morning.
Sydney Airport CEO Geoff Culbert said it has been challenging for everyone involved, including passengers.
“We’ve got staff shortages, we’ve been rebuilding the business from the ground up,” Mr Culbert told 2GB’s Chris Smith.
“You go back to November last year, and we were all in lockdown, we were operating at one per cent of normal capacity and we all started recruiting for Easter back in December last year, right when we got a sense of the borders were going to open but we just haven’t been able to get enough staff.
“Then you add on top of that the Covid issues, on any given day up to 20 per cent of staff can’t come to work due to Covid. So we’re running at 60 per cent of ordinary staff capacity.”
