EasyJet moves out of Warsaw

Low-cost carrier EasyJet has decided to withdraw its operations from Warsaw as of July 6 citing high airport fees as a reason. In a recent letter to the editor published by the Polish edition of Newsweek, Oliver Aust, head of corporate affairs at EasyJet Airline Co. Ltd, explained that the move was forced by an increase of airport taxes by the Polish Airports State Enterprise, the operator of Warsaw airport. According to Aust, the increase is aimed at helping LOT Polish Airlines, Warsaw airport main user, to eliminate the competition in Poland's capital. "Accepting the fee increase would mean that our passengers would have to bear additional ticket costs, which in fact would subsidize LOT, and for that we cannot agree," Aust wrote.

Warsaw airport celebrating 75 years

The airport in the Okęcie neighborhood of Warsaw was officialy opened on April 29, 1934 by then president Ignacy Mościcki. After being moved from an airfield on Pole Mokotowskie the new airport comprised a terminal building with a concrete apron for planes, which had been taking-off and landing on a grass runway strip. The tower was guiding planes with a spotlight, like lighthouses do. The terminal building was situated in between two hangars. In 1934, the first year of operation, the airport served 10,750 passengers. Warsaw was connected via air with 6 domestic airports and 17 airports abroad. The furthest destinations included Tel-Aviv and Beirut.


Photo found on Poszukiwanieskarbow.com

The plans of launching trans-atlantic flights were restrained by the outbreak of World War II, during which the airport was destroyed completely. In 1947 the new terminal and ATC tower were completed, along with a concrete apron and a concrete runway. At the end of 1940s Warsaw had air links with Belgrade, Berlin, Bucarest, Brussels, Copenhagen, Prague and Stockholm.


Photo found on Lotnictwo.net.pl

The new international terminal was opened in 1969. Two years later marked the first million of passengers served. The growing passenger traffic in the following yeras caused the airport authorities to move domestic flights and international arrivals into other temporary buildings. The one for international arrivals has served until recently as a terminal "Etiuda" for low-cost carriers. While former domestic terminal is serving now as a terminal for private and corporate jets.

The current Terminal 1 was opened on July 1, 1992. It included a multi-storey parking garage and a web of access roads. A part of the building was dedicated for domestic air traffic. The first arrivals onto the new terminal were flights from Athens, Bangkok and New York.

In 2001 the airport commonly known as Okęcie, for the neighberhood it is located in, was officialy named after Polish composer Frederic Chopin, and 2008 saw opening of the new Terminal 2 building. The latter is a place of an ongoing exhibition on the history of the Warsaw airport. Last year the aiport served a total of 9,436,958 passengers.

See the official website of the airport

See the airport on Google Maps

An interesting article in Polish on pre-war airport in Warsaw

New hotel coming to Warsaw airport

“Polish Airports” State Enterprise (PPL) has signed a contract with JEMS Architekci, which will design the five-star hotel for the Frederic Chopic International Airport in Warsaw. PPL will invest abou zł.120 million in the development of the new property.

It will be the second hotel facility at the airport beside Courtyard by Marriott. The groundbreaking is planned for the summer of 2010, while the first guest will be able to check in before the Euro 2012 soccer championship in Poland. The construction is valued at zł.90 million and the interior decoration and equipment will take up additional zł.30 million. JEMS Architekci, which will receive zł.6.7 million for their project, was selected from 39 competition participants.

Detailed blueprint of the hotel can be found HERE

Airport neighbors complain about noise

Citizens of Warsaw living in a proximity of Warsaw Frederic Chopin International Airport announced they will fight in court to achieve a halt on flights at nighttime. Those living at a close range to edges of runways, have to deal with the worst noise. The last flights arrive even at 1 am, while the regular air traffic starts at 5 pm. These red-eye flights are mainly performed by the low-cost carriers, although aiprort imposes higher fees for those late-night flights.

The citizens want to impose a curfew between 10 pm and 6 am. In 2007 the authorities established a noise free zone around the airport. The citizens were promised subsidies to replace their windows with noise reduction ones and compensations in case their houses' value went down.

However, the airport's authorities have turned all the requests down, arguing that a court is the right institution to evaluate the property loss and order a compensation. Deadline for claiming the damages is August 2009.

Final farewell to Etiuda terminal in Warsaw

On Saturday evening, March 28, authorities of Warsaw airport will close the Etiuda terminal, which was serving low-cost carriers and their passengers. Last November it was decided that LCCs will be moved to the main airport building starting on March 29, the day of implementing the summer schedule.

"Etiuda was a temporary solution, created to cater for rapidly growing passenger traffic, while Terminal 2 was under construction," said Jakub Mielniczuk, spokesperson for PP Porty Lotnicze, which owns, manages and operates most of Polish regional airports and the Warsaw's Frederic Chopin International Airport.

"The passenger comfort that Etiuda provided was far from what the Chopin Airport wants to offer passengers, no matter their airline or destination," added Mielniczuk.

Etiuda was used by Wizz Air, Norwegian Air Shuttle, Germanwings, Easy Jet and Iceland Express.

Warsaw Airport introduced luggage wrapping

To provide passengers' luggage with additional security and prevent it from being damaged Warsaw airport introduced an extra service of wrapping checked-in luggage in foil.
A-500camp service by SI.BA is able to wrap not only standard bags, but also oversized luggage, such as golf equipment or surfing boards. The price is 25 zł per piece of luggage and is provided in two wrapping stations - in Terminals 1 and 2. SI.BA is providing its services at 19 airports in Europe.

WAW 40% increase in charter passengers

Warsaw airport had a 41.7% increase in charter passenger traffic last year. For the first time the number of passengers on charter flights exceeded 1 million in a single year, reaching 1,175,382 compared to 828,401 in 2007.

The total passenger turnover on Warsaw airport in 2008 amounted to 9,482,608 (of chartered and scheduled flights).

The number of all passenger operations in 2008 was 129,728. It is a 2.6% decrease y/y. "Increased number of served passengers with decrased number of operations means that there are more bigger and filled to capacity planes arriving in Warsaw", said Jakub Mielniczuk, a spokesperson for Warsaw's Chopin Airport.

2 emergency landings in Poland

Easter Monday was an unusual day for Polish ATC. They had to deal with two emergancy landings in one day.

First a Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt to Kiev, Ukraine had to land in Katowice, when one of the drunk passengers claimed to be a terrorist. After emergency landing the citizen of Russia was detained by Polish border protection officers. During the flight man loudly demanded alcohol and finally shouted that he is a terrorist three times. He declined to give permission to check level of alcohol in his blood. His luggage contained nothing that could be an evidence that he was indeed a terrorist. However, the procedures demanded that the crew landed at the closest airport. The Airbus A320 carrying over one hundred people continued its flight to Kiev.

Two hours later there was another Lufthansa emergency landing, this time in Warsaw. It was allegedly another drunk passanger, whose uncontrolled behaviour led the crew to land. The plane was flying from Bangkok en route to Duesseldorf. There were no signs of the passenger carrying a gun or posing a threat to anyone in the cabin. He is a citizen of Germany, and was accompanied by his wife and a child. After he was detained by Polish border security, his wife decided that she would continue the flight to Germany.

Ground personnel strike in Warsaw

Wednesday's 2-hour strike at Okecie airport in Warsaw forced Polish Airlines LOT, its domestic subsidiary EuroLot and its low-cost carrier Centralwings to cancel 10 flights and caused 32 delays. Ground workers refused to check-in passengers' luggage for LOT's flights, handle checked-in luggage and issue boarding passes. Other flights departing from Warsaw were unaffected. Ground personnel that are members of 3 labor unions working for LOT Ground Services - a company dependent of LOT - demand raise in pay, a change in pension plans and bigger compensation in case of group reductions. Around 1600 union members participated in the warning strike.

A labor union of flight attendants working for LOT also threatened to perform a strike this week. They demand 30 percent raise. Polish Airlines board of directors is ready to propose 4 times less.

Warsaw airport runway repair

Expect some delays while travelling to or via Warsaw, Poland these days. One of two airport's runways is being repaired. The works are scheduled to end on October 10. temporarily nly one of the airport's runway will be in use. ATC is expecting more air traffic within the next two weeks.

Photo shows Warsaw airport runways from bird's eye view.

Warsaw low-cost terminal struck by computer failure

"Etiuda" terminal at Warsaw airport - which is serving budget airlines - was paralyzed by a server failure that lasted approximately 2 hours on Wednesday. All of departures have been delayed by at least 90 minutes. The proper terminal operations were restored later that afternoon.
The ground personnel had to check-in passengers manually, not being able to rely on a computer server based in Copenhagen, Denmark. Similar problems took place on six other European airports.

Warsaw airport evacuated

Domestic terminal and part of the main international departures hall had to be vacated on Monday morning when a suspicious looking motorcycle was spotted in front of the airport building. The preliminary x-ray showed wires and boxes inside the bike's trunk. However, later it was discovered that the trunk didn't contain anything dangerous. The airport could resume its regular service with delays on some international departures. The owner of the motorcycle can be fined with a parking ticket and the airport authorities can sue him for costs associated with the evacuation.
I couldn't find any information, however, on the delays and a few hour evacuation on the aiport's English version website. Passengers were really cooperative, they just wish they were put somewhere else than in the direct sunlight for a few hours.

See the pictures from a Polish newspaper

Emergency landing at Warsaw airport

A Danish plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Warsaw on Monday afternoon after the cockpit instruments alerted the crew about an onboard fire. A Boeing of Sterling - which is a Danish low-cost carrier - was making its flight from Stockholm to Budapest. After the emergency landing the passangers and crew have been evacuated, but the airports fire department did not find any traces of the fire.

See the plane landing/Zobacz lądowanie samolotu

www.sterling.dk
the carrier is flying to/from Krakow

Awaryjne lądowanie na Okęciu
Samolot duńskich linii lotniczych Sterling awaryjnie lądował w poniedziałek, kilka minut po godzinie 14, na warszawskim Okęciu. Samolot leciał ze Sztokholmu do Budapesztu - poinformował rzecznik prasowy Polskich Portów Lotniczych Artur Burak.
Dodał, że lądowanie odbyło się bez problemów, nikt nie został poszkodowany, pasażerowie wyszli z samolotu.
- Pilot sygnalizował problemy, więc zgodnie z procedurami lądował. Pilot nie może zignorować takiego sygnału. Po wylądowaniu na pokład weszli strażacy, jednak nie stwierdzili żadnych problemów - powiedział Burak.
Źródło: Onet.pl