Too many boardings or too few gates. Or both factors. Net of the possible causes, this morning the result at Elmas airport was traffic jam: the queue of passengers ready to take off from Mario Mameli reached up to the automatic entrance doors of the airport. The waiting time to cross the threshold of the "sterile" area, after the baggage check, was about an hour.

The image is eloquent, it was taken shortly after 8 on Sunday morning. Tourists at the end of their holiday and Sardinians intent on enjoying theirs, with varying advances on the boarding time, showed up at the departures. There were those who didn't have time to take a step inside and had to stop. Because the queue for the preliminary check of travel documents reached up to that point. A queue that continued, without interruption, up to the conveyors for scanning the suitcases, after a long snake that advanced with exasperating slowness. Especially for last-minute travellers, i.e. those who show up at the airport with little margin before take-off.

The monitors of Sogaer - the airport management company - say that up to 11 am 17 flights were scheduled to depart. The Mario Mameli gates worked at full capacity. It appears that only one was closed.

(Unioneonline/E.Fr.)