On February 21st 2014, security personnel on Frankfurt Airport striked. By chance, yours truly was right in the middle of this situation, and some obvious lessons became apparent. (Most important one: see previous blog)

Background

The trade Union Ver.di called on 5,000 security staff to stop handling 150,000 passengers on a typical (busy) Friday. According to news reports, 50 flights were cancelled, many delayed, and shortly after lunch the airport stopped admitting any new passengers altogether.

There are differing accounts on how many of the security personnel participated in the strike, Reuters quoted Ver.di’s 90%. participation rate although it remained unclear whether that meant 90% of union membership or 90% of all security personnel. The latter is unlikely, since 700 (=14%) of security personnel are directly employed by Fraport and apparently not covered by the strikes. dw.de reported 800 people on strike (only about 16%). Adding other temporary workers was not a feasible option for management due to training requirements, on the other hand, administrative personnel jumped in to help out as well. Either way, there was security capacity left. The question remains how to deploy the remaining capacity and manage the situation albeit sub-optimally.

Not all information on how the strike has been managed is public, but in general one can say that ‘keeping order’ is crucial in keeping the system running. Too much anxiety creates stress, raises body temperature and diminishes the tendency to abide by civil rules with the waiting passengers and the whole carefully designed system of waiting queues disintegrates while the passengers turn into an unruly mob. When that happens, even additional relief measures like 110 Ver-di members interrupting their strike do not alleviate the situation any more and the only sensible alternative remaining is to close down parts of the system, as happened at Fraport.

The following lessons can be learned from this strike. (‘Streik’in German)

1. Manage expectations at check-in

When checking in luggage one and a half hours before departure, the attendant already indicated it was doubtful one would make one’s flight. Uncertainty creates anxiety. Much better would have been: “I am sorry Sir, but there is a strike by security personnel. The estimated delay for getting to the Gates is now about 2 hours. Therefore, you will miss your flight. [not ‘probably’, since that raises hope again] If you proceed to the Service Center behind security, they will help you in finding an alternative flight.”

In case the passenger protests: “Yes, I understand your disappointment. Please be aware that we always ask passengers to be present 2 hours before departure of an international flight to allow for delays like these.”

2. Basic lay-out

At the second line to get into the airport (the scan of a boarding pass), no line dividers were present, and multiple desperate travellers – somehow most of apparent foreign origin and with claims they did not speak English or German very well – therefore tried to ‘jump line’ by walking around the queues. The simple addition of those omnipresent line dividers would have helped. Any security staff or information officer is best placed at the beginning of the lines, not at the end.

What did not help is that signs to Gates C are sometimes absent and sometimes contradictory. When information offices are not occupied and most ‘normal’ employees do not have a clue how to get there either, it is an indication that the general lay-out deserves attention. Color codes might do wonders, another alternative is to make 1 ‘orientation point’ per gate-section, from which it is easy to find the last stretch.

The unclarity about how to reach connecting gates was exacerbated by some passengers’ need to pass high security sluices that looked like employee-only ones, with code pads on the right and no apparent ‘passenger-signature’.

3. Manage expectations in line

In most amusement parks, managing queues is core business. At Fraport it apparently was not. An electronic sign indicating waiting time was not in use, but simple signs stating ‘from here the expected waiting time is 1 hour’ invite passengers to make calculations whether they will make their flight or not. Resignation to the inevitable reduces tension etc.

To set this up is not too difficult: one know’s how many passengers are processed by a security check point on average, and how many people are there per meter of waiting line. One could even do this very sophisticated with geo-tagging of telephone sets progressing through the lines, although that might be overdoing it. Keep in mind that nobody really cares about pinpoint accuracy in such a situation, a rough estimate is all that is required.

4. Reduce the pain of waiting in line

Stranded passenger s need ‘only’a couple of things, in order of importance: toilets, food and drink, place to sit/sleep, wi-fi and power.

Toilets are difficult to come by in a waiting line of 2 hours, although in general there are plenty of clean ones at Fraport. (Graffiti feedback from one passenger: “…a great way to piss”.)

One of the great gestures on February 21 was the distribution of water, ‘Apfelschorle’ (Apple juice with mineral water, a German favorite) and various sweets to people in the waiting line for the Service Center (behind the security checks). Where one could be vicariously ashamed for the egocentricity displayed by many travellers plundering these carts, it was awesome to see that even after the first ravageous attacks, there was still plenty for all. These carts, however, at around 10:00 am came too late, when passengers were already in the second queue at the Service Center behind security. Ice cream (the cheap water ice cream would do) handed out while waiting approx. 1,5 hours for the security checkpoint would have been even more effective.

The third item a stranded passenger needs is a place to sit or sleep. The chairs at FRA lack arm rests, so could function as needed, and there were sufficient of them. Although not in the line for the security check. The free one hour Telekom internet since January 2014 is great in normal cases, but has the minor disadvantage that it does not reach all of these seating arrangements.
However, what was severely lacking in general were power outlets for the various electronic gadgets that rule our lives these day: one traveller at the C-pier had to continuously choose whether to stay with his luggage and a comfortable seat, or squeeze by a smoking cabin towards a power outlet a little further where his iPhone was hooked up to it’s life support. In several waiting areas very comfortable chairs are available, but only enough power outlets to allow for ‘the cleaning lady and her vacuumer’, it seems. Even the frames of these chairs have nice, straight tubes which would be perfectly fit for power cords extension.

5. Manage the waiting queues properly

First of all, these numbers of people together means the generation of warmth. At Fraport passengers were waiting in an unairconditioned area, which meant most people were perspiring uncomfortably, many were taking off (superfluous) layers of clothing, and several were even fainting. Others had to leave the queue to go to the toilet. The anxiety about whether or not they would make their flights only exacerbated the situation. Either ensure a proper temperature, or take care of it differently.

Second, there is a natural tendency for authorities to create separate waiting queues for different security checkpoints. However, in case of massive queues, if you split them up late, there will be more physical distance covering passengers experience, making the feeling of delay less.

One thing that went well was the waiting line for the Service Center, where passengers were given numbers for waiting in line. Even though the effective waiting time ultimately turned out to be about the same as for the security check (about 1,5 hours), almost no incidents took place there. There is no obvious reason why this could not have been modified for the security checkpoint as well: dole out ticket numbers at the point of checking in (passengers with online boarding pass and without luggage could be re-directed to the check-in). That Business and First Class travellers might have a separate security checkpoint is a shoe-in. By indicating that numbers up to 1500 would be allowed to enter the waiting halls at 9:00 am, and numbers up to 2.000 at 9:30 am, the people in line would obtain clarity. That some are immediately experiencing anger for missing their flight is true, but all would be freed up from the waiting queues and, even more importantly, they would be naturally directed to the various restaurants, bars and shops where they could much more effectively – and profitably – spend their time.

6. Provide to-the-point information

That messages like ‘Passenger flight 230 to Toronto is now boarding at Gate B20’ are tedious but useful in a generic airport environment is clear. To broadcast this message to these passengers trying to get inside the airport but stuck before security this message adds insult to injury. We have all these modern systems where we can decide to send messages to this distribution list or the other, why can’t we do the same with an airport public address system?

Similarly, an at first inaudibly soft message informing all in line that due to strikes there will be delays did not really make sense to those who had just spent 2 hours in the resultant waiting lines, while it would be highly relevant for those left outside the security area.

7. Emergency Concepts

At 2:00 pm, the announcement came that no more security checks were going to take place. By itself this was a very sensible measure to take . In addition, it urged passengers to re-book via their airline or online, there was no mention of the already overburdened airport staff, which also made sense. However, it was unnecessarily disconcerting to those already in the transit area since there the available capacity security personnel security was used for checks for transit passengers. A properly distributed and properly worded message would have been more appropriate.

Many national flights were cancelled and changed to train alternatives, which was a sensible move. Although it would have been quite difficult to assess in the undoubtedly unclear situation on the day itself, this also could have been applied to some international lfights like to Amsterdam (4 hours by ICE), Brussels, Paris and Vienna; the earlier certain flights would be cancelled and re-routed, the more pressure would be taken off the security checkpoints by re-booking their passengers to other days or means via the original check-in counters

A simple alternative of delaying all flights by the extra time required for security checks does not always work in aviation because of corresponding landing slots at other airports. However, delays of certain length are fairly common, is it not because of strikes then because of weather conditions etc. To what extent this has been used or could be further improved can only assessed with internal Fraport information.

An additional measure that could have been made – although with the limited public information it is impossible to assess it’s practicality – is to just ‘forget’ about luggage checks and only register and store these in a separate area, while using the capacity thus saved for passenger screening. (Since Ver.di is claiming a generic pay for all of the security handlers, regardless of their actual work, they all should be able to perform the same work, right?)

8. Ask the customers for help in maintaining order

In a separate blog I proposed how to use customer help in maintaining order, a topic by itself.

9. Sabotage?

One transit passenger reported that he had been forced to leave the transit area and enter via the security check again because of a closed door. Unconfirmed rumours said that the problems in Fraport were thus exacerbated by striking workers to additionally force transit passengers via the already overloaded security checkpoints.

If that were the case, it is difficult to imagine regular civilians would have done so. So, then either security personnel in their private time (=legally just normal civilians) did so, and at least security personnel on duty allowed it to happen. If personnel on duty was responsible, they acted against the interests of Fraport. Possibly a quirk of German (employment) law might intervene, but there are nations where this would be ground for immediate dismissal. If civilians interfered, that might be grounds for (additional) criminal prosecution.

In summary, there were several emergency measures that worked very well, but there are significant areas for improvement in the Emergency Concept for Fraport, to ensure that next time the effects of a ‘calamity’ are diminished. Let’s hope they are applied.

(Originally posted February 27, 2014)