Fewer staff and more: the aviation industry has failed

The high cruising speed was once considered the great advantage of flying.

The fact that airlines and airports are now urging holidaymakers to come to the terminal hours earlier due to staff shortages erases the advantage.

This applies all the more to the advice to carry luggage – if possible – a day earlier for check-in the evening before.

No vacationer would stand by his car for hours before setting off.

Aviation expects such behavior from its customers for flights.

Queues, bizarre delays and, in the worst case, the experience that the suitcase will travel later because there was no one who could load it in time are all part of the list of summer's unreasonable demands.

That annoys vacationers – understandably.

Aviation is extremely poorly prepared for the return of the demand that was missed during the pandemic.

The number that 499 percent more passengers used German airports in April than in the same month last year sounds overwhelming.

It seems less colossal when you consider that there were 36 percent more travelers before the pandemic.

Nevertheless, it bumped at Easter - a foretaste of summer, when the gap to the old normal is smaller.

At the beginning of the pandemic, they went underground

Then travelers get the feeling that jobs were cut during the pandemic and that in retrospect the savings were too energetic.

The right time to change course was also missed.

It's no surprise that people are starting to go on vacation again because corona restrictions have been lifted.

Travel sellers have been talking about the coming recovery for half a year - on vacation for customers, in business for themselves.

There is no other way to put it: Aviation is adept at thinning out and saving, but not at ramping up again.

At the beginning of the pandemic, airlines became virtually unavailable for weeks or months.

Ticket refunds took ages.

Customers were rightly angry.

Now they are returning - and once again experience a bottleneck in the industry.

This time there is a lack of staff at airport counters, security checks, when loading aircraft, sometimes even in the cockpit.

An industry risks leaving its customers with a devastating impression for an extended period of time.

The car is good for the summer

A week before North Rhine-Westphalia heralds the start of the summer vacation phase, the lack of foresight has given way to an almost panicky activism.

Staff is still being recruited.

With a view to the summer, this is only a show measure.

It is clear to everyone involved that new personnel for the security area of ​​airports must first undergo an official examination.

Nobody who is still being recruited now will be available for the holidays, but only afterwards - when the wave of holidaymakers has subsided and, in the worst case, the corona virus slows it down again.

Aviation associations are begging the federal government to support the use of temporary workers from abroad.

2000 forces from Turkey are to step in.

The necessary formal simplifications please quickly, otherwise what travelers call chaos threatens beyond the summer - it looks like a threat.

One can argue about the shape of the emergency aid plan, but not about the fact that it too was brought into the discussion too late.

The labor shortage is just as unsurprising as the increase in travellers.

During the pandemic, employees turned away from aviation, and short-time work benefits, which were meager due to low wages, made the decision easy.

Day and night, in the winter storm and in the summer heat, heaving suitcases onto airplanes is not an attractive job at low wages.

Unions, which in recent years have won extreme premiums for security check personnel, will now turn their attention to ground handling services.

The costs of aviation will increase - not only because of climate regulations.

One can complain about flying.

But the train is currently not a comfortable means of transport either.

Bottlenecks and many construction sites cause delays and cancellations.

As harsh as it sounds, this summer vacationers are most likely to control their travel time by getting in the car.

For a travel industry that relies on the plane for waves of holidaymakers heading to the Mediterranean and recommends the train in sustainability rounds, the failure across the board is a blow.

People who want to relax could imagine the first big summer of travel without pandemic conditions differently.

You could be bitterly disappointed.