Stansted Airport: Huge queues and flights missed amid baggage system 'chaos'

17 October 2021, 23:07 | Updated: 17 October 2021, 23:26

Passengers at Stansted Airport faced long queues and temporary luggage losses after a technical issue on Sunday.

Airport bosses have apologised for the delays, which were caused by issues with the hold baggage system at the airport in Essex.

They are asking people to arrive at least three hours before their flight due to the knock-on effect.

The fault affected the airport's hold baggage system, meaning that luggage had to be manually processed.

Queues spread across the airport as passengers tried to access their belongings or find members of staff to assist them.

People flocked to social media to request help from the airport, with one person describing it as "chaos" and complaining there were no staff around to help.

One couple told reporters they were "turned away" after their gate closed.

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They had arrived at the airport at 4.30am and described the scenes as "chaos", explaining how queues snaked around the building.

Stansted Airport has since apologised for the incident, but has also requested that customers still arrive at least three hours before their flight due to the knock-on effect.

A spokesperson for Stansted airport said: "London Stansted apologises for any inconvenience caused to passengers this morning due to a technical issue affecting the airport's hold baggage system.

"Contingency measures were immediately put in place with our airlines to mitigate disruption and manually process baggage while engineers worked to fix the issue.

"The system is now operating as normal but passengers are still asked to arrive at the airport at least three hours before their flight departs in accordance with their airline's latest advice."

In May, Stansted airport completed its biggest baggage network upgrade since the terminals launch in 1991, costing £70 million.

The work took four years and involved replacing the previous system of conveyor belts and chutes with 2.4km of track and 180 automated carts.