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Air travel is the only form of transportation that has gone backwards in the last 20 years.
Trains run faster now. Buses less pollution. Cars are smart and electric. So are bicycles, boats and cars.
Flying, on the other hand, is even more horrible than it used to be. In the year Years after a British terrorist failed to detonate a bomb in his shoes on a flight from Paris to Miami in 2001, fliers still face strange laws on liquids as they pay for free sandwiches crammed into tiny seats.
Flying may be cheap and safe, but when Concorde made its last flight across the Atlantic in 2010, That’s slower than it was in 2003 – half the time it takes today. Airlines have promised the return of supersonic flight. does not.
I wrote a version of these words back in 2011 when I was the aerospace correspondent for the Financial Times.
This thought came to mind last week as I stood in a long line at a small airport in Spain and saw something I had never seen in more than 30 years of flying.
The line was packed with people boarding two flights to London, one to Gatwick, where I was, and one to Stansted, both leaving around 11am.
We lined up to get our passports stamped, one of which was after Brexit, with waiting planes clearly visible a few meters from the exit gates.
As the clock ticked towards 11 o’clock and the threat of locked doors grew, there was a commotion at the front of the queue.
Passengers heading to Stansted, parents who had been queuing for ages with toddlers, began shouting at the flight attendant not to call them to the front of the line.
All at once several made a break to pass the passport station. A brave policeman closed the station and ordered everyone to sit down.
Those who tried to escape returned and reported that the door was locked and were arrested. New flightsNo airline help in sight.
This was just one small drama among the thousands that turned flying into a hellscape of canceled flights, lost luggage and unspeakable queues.
Epidemic labor shortages and supply chain failures driving this violence are less visible than Icelandic volcanic ash and air travel problems past the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but they are just as worrisome.
Last week, executives at Heathrow Airport and Qatar Airways warned that the industrial disruption could last longer than expected. “I think it will last for two years,” Qatar Airways chief executive Akbar Al Baker told FTA.
A cottage industry has supposedly sprung up to advise travelers what to do. Some advice is obvious: prepare for queues; fly straight; Take hand luggage only and if you have to check bags, bring medicine and other essentials in the cabin.
Some ideas seem wrong: you can check your bags in the evening before the morning flight with some airlines and many experts recommend, because you can travel calmly the next day. But it takes a further journey into the nightmare that is today’s airport.
Another tip was new to me. Early flights are rarely canceled, so it’s best to fly as early as possible, a flight attendant wrote in the New York Times the other week.
Later flights are more vulnerable to thunderstorms as the days get warmer, plus traffic at busy airports increases and crews reach their duty limits.
For what it’s worth, my brush with summer travel has taught me this: it’s more important than ever to fly on weekdays if you can.
If you’re in a long line, don’t be afraid to ask the staff to move you to the front of the line if it’s getting close to boarding time.
Finally, they are happy for those employees. Most of them are doing their best to face the difficult situation they cannot escape. You, with luck, are just passing through.
pilita.clark@ft.com
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