A giant statue of Lionardo da Vinci greets passengers as they arrive at Rome’s main airport, also called Rome Fiumicino Airport (FCO), promoted as one of Europe’s busiest and modern hubs.
The multi-talented engineer, architect and painter, (born 1452, died 1519), to name just three of his talents, would possibly turn in his grave if he saw what transpired on one day this week.
Modern airport yes, effective not on this occasion, and one was promoted to ponder what would happened in the event of a fire.
Basically, the only down escalator, linking the impressive shopping area to the restaurant quarter, was not operating, but you could walk down. We asked airport staff if there was an alternative means to get to the floor below. No was the reply.
Not good enough. One security man we approached said he was security and not maintenance. We replied: “Surely you know who to contact to alert.”
Furthermore, could administrative staff not see for themselves on CCTV or any other means of internal communication what was unfolding in T3?
Lifts were also not working and the situation caused chaos and great stress to passengers.
Those in the upper floor, including ourselves, could not get down to access boarding gates, leaving many angry, frustrated and in fear or not making their flights.
The elevator from the downstairs shopping area, however, continued to operate, bringing more and more passengers to the already packed upstairs floor. We can’t speak Italian, but there did not appear to be any announcements.
Furthermore, there did not appear, I stress appear, to be any staff taking account of the drama.
A queue quickly formed, and it eventually snaked around most of the upstairs area, and, there were hundreds of anxious passengers, including disabled and young children, in it.
Making matters even worse, in our case, was after queuing for almost 40 minutes to walk down the elevator under maintenance, it burst into life.
We could only laugh. Then, the elevator we were about to walk onto to go down to our gate packed in. It was obviously not our day.
After all that, we needed a comfort break. Imagine our dismay when the gents urinals were cordoned off and we had to queue for a cabin.
You could not have made this up. Overall, the phrase style without substance comes to mind. A review may be in order and, if you travel to Rome, then be mindful of what happened here and give yourself plenty of time.
