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Security to curb passengers
22/06/2007 12:12 - (SA)
Rio De Janeiro, Brazil - Authorities beefed up security at airports across Brazil on Thursday to protect airline workers from fist-waving passengers angered by flight delays and cancellations.
Passengers shouted and tried to storm ticket counters at the Brazilian airports to demand transfers to other flights on Wednesday night. The problems continued on Thursday, with 411 of the 1 114 flights scheduled between midnight and 15:00 being delayed for more than an hour and 104 others being cancelled, according to Brazil's airport authority, Infraero.
Among travellers affected were members of Brazil's national soccer team whose flight to Venezuela for the Copa America tournament was delayed four hours.
The air force, which oversees Brazil's air traffic control system, issued a statement blaming the delays on problems with radar screens and a communication link failure.
The crisis forced Defence Minister Waldir Pires to return early from the Paris air show, his office said.
Faced with rising tempers among passengers, authorities sent extra officers to airports in Rio, Brasilia and Porto Velho.
On Thursday, however, passengers seemed increasingly resigned to waiting in the long lines that sprung up outside of most airline ticket counters.
'We are near the limit'
"The atmosphere is very worrisome. We are taking all the necessary measures but we are near the limit," Infraero President Brig Jose Carlos Pereira told reporters.
The air problems in Brazil come just over a week after terminal workers at an airport in Buenos Aires, the Argentine capital, struck for two days to demand greater security from infuriated passengers, some of whom scuffled with ticket agents because of cancelled flights.
Brazil's aviation system already were plagued by delays, some due to a work slowdown by air traffic controllers protesting expected disciplinary measures against the leaders of a March 29 strike that brought flights to a standstill across Brazil for nearly five hours.
On Tuesday, flights at most airports were halted for two hours as controllers reported problems with their radar screens.
On Wednesday, the Air Force also ordered the president of the air traffic controllers' federation, Carlos Trifilio, to be imprisoned for giving unauthorised interviews to media.
Controllers allege that poor working conditions and inadequate training are putting the public at risk.
- AP
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