“This is a group of 200 travelers who were to fly from Brussels to Cameroon on Wednesday,” said airport spokeswoman Nathalie Pierard. “The plane encountered a technical problem over France and had to return to Brussels Airport. So these people had to spend the night at the airport.”
Their aircraft was to leave for Cameroon on Wednesday morning, but had to turn back due to a technical problem to return to Brussels Airport. The stranded passengers were forced to stay at the airport, not having a valid visa as they were supposed to be simply in transit. No solution might be found since yesterday, the other flight of this Thursday bound for Douala being filled. Dissatisfied, travelers therefore decided to block access to terminal B.
For the moment, the delays for the other flights are still few, specifies HLN. There was still a delay of 45 minutes for a flight to Egypt, and one hour for another to Côte d’Ivoire.
The airport is trying to calm the situation and is organizing shuttle buses for passengers scheduled on other non-Schengen flights. These being few in number, this limits the disturbances, affirms the airport. Some Tui flights are currently experiencing delays of around 30 minutes.
The police went to the scene to calm things down.
“The situation returned to calm shortly before 11 a.m. and the passengers who were blocking the terminal dispersed”, tells us Nathalie Pierard, spokeswoman for Brussels Airport.
According to Brussels Airport, around fifty non-Schengen flights were affected by this protest movement. With delays ranging from a few minutes to almost two hours. “The traditional way to reach the boarding gates being blocked, we made pass the passengers of the other flights by other routes. The delays are being reduced but some flights might still be impacted during the day.
Contacted by us, the spokesperson for Brussels Airlines, Joëlle Neeb, confirms that a solution has been found for all passengers. Which have received an SMS telling them the date and time of their next flight. With priority given to families with children.” Some passengers will leave today, others tomorrow or in the next few days, says Joëlle Neeb. A total of 273 passengers are affected but only 40 of them, who did not have a suitable visa to enter Belgian territory, had to spend the night at the airport. The others were taken care of by the company and were able to spend the night in hotels.”
For passengers without via who might not take a flight once more until tomorrow or the day following tomorrow, a temporary visa solution has been requested from the Foreigners Office, so as to allow them to leave the airport to spend the night in a hotel. “We have exceptionally set up a second flight for Douala this Friday, ends Joëlle Neeb. This will allow all passengers to reach their final destination this Friday, December 9.
