Yesterday morning, operations at Queen Beatrix International Airport were seriously affected when an issue with the air conditioning system was discovered. Through their Facebook page, the airport announced that due to unforeseen technical problems with their air conditioning system, they had to temporarily halt all passengers processing.
“For safety and comfort reasons, we ask all passengers who have not yet arrived at the airport to refrain from coming at this time. We are closely monitoring the situation and will provide updates as more information becomes available,” the post continued.
The first update arrived at 10:40 a.m., indicating that the airport would be closed for approximately three hours due to the technical issue with their air conditioning system. This closure affected all flights, both departing from and arriving to Aruba.
By 1:05 p.m., the second update on their Facebook page indicated that the technical problem would persist for another six hours, and the airport would remain closed until 7:30 p.m.
The third update was issued at 2:15 p.m., in which the airport explained that a rupture in the main chiller pipeline was the cause of the significant issue. The estimated time to fix the problem was stated to be five to seven hours.
This caused a wave of reactions from tourists who expressed their frustration and dissatisfaction. Many questioned what would be done regarding their accommodations in the event of canceled flights and why all airport operations needed to stop for this issue.
Many found this inconvenience unacceptable and questioned why there wasn’t an emergency plan in place for such occurrences.
The last update the airport published on their Facebook page indicated that the airport would remain closed until 7:00 a.m. today.
During a press conference yesterday afternoon, they stated that the airport would cover the costs of lodging and new flight reservations for the passengers through each airline. They also provided more details regarding the decision to close the airport.
According to the spokesperson, the airport decided to close its doors for the rest of the day mainly due to the lack of sufficient accommodations and safety for passengers. They emphasized that the arrival of more passengers from abroad would put too much pressure on hotels and Airbnb, which already had to accommodate around 4,000 unexpected guests stranded in Aruba.
They also explained that the technical failure that caused the major operational disruption. As mentioned, the underground pipeline of the main chiller broke, causing the terminals to overheat and the airport’s Building Management System (BMS) to start giving errors. As a result, this posed a safety issue for the passengers, as the floors could become slippery due to condensation.
The airport emphasized that due to the disruption, only eight to nine flights managed to depart, leaving approximately 30 remaining flights delayed. As a result, today, the airport will be even busier, accommodating the 4,000 passengers who missed their flights, in addition to approximately 5,000 more scheduled to fly today.
This is not the first time this year that the airport has encountered this type of problem. In January, there was a similar issue that drastically affected the airport’s operations.
