Palma airport yesterday experienced a chaotic day due to the heavy rains that fell in the afternoon causing severe flooding that flooded the building, the parking, the accesses to Son Sant Joan and the runway. The water fell in torrents, for example, through the roof of the commercial area of the duty free in the newly renovated terminal A.
Aena had to activate the emergency plan and operations were interrupted, with no landings or take-offs. All this on a day in which there were more than 900 flights were scheduled, of which 100 were affected by diversions or cancellations. Cancellations and delays, with many detour, such as to Barcelona, Ibiza and Menorca airports, disrupted a variety of travel plans as water cascaded through the roofs and the runway was transformed into an impressive river.
Flights to Ibiza
At least three flights from Palma to Ibiza were delayed, as were five flights in the opposite direction. In addition, flights to the Balearic capital at 17.55, 20.45 and 21.20 were cancelled.
45 liters fell in one hour with peaks of up to 90 liters, according to the Aemet, as Aena reported.
In total, the airport manager accounted for a hundred cancellations and diversions. Aircraft departures and arrivals were interrupted for two hours “in the face of the impossibility of operating safely”.
Takeoffs were resumed first, around half past five o’clock, and an hour later all operations began. Flights that had been diverted to other terminals were scheduled to arrive throughout the day.
A strong storm floods Palma airport and affects flights from Ibiza
Flooded ceilings
The storm raged over Son Sant Joan especially between two and three-thirty in the afternoon. It was such a the force of the water that inside the building the roofs could not hold up and began to pitch.
According to Aemet data, in just one hour 43.8 liters per square meter fell on the airport. That strong discharge occurred at about 12.40 a.m. It was one of the areas of Palma where the rain was most concentrated. Up to 53 liters per square meter were registered.
Several videos released by airport workers and passengers showed heavy cascades of water falling on the entrance gates to access the security checkpoint or check-in counters. The image was repeated in the duty free, completely deserted and flooded.
“It is impressive this chaos in the third largest airport in Spain”summarized a terminal employee stationed at his work area in the check-in area, just overlooking one of the ‘waterfalls’ of Son San Joan.
The computer systems were working, according to a flight attendant at the ticket counters Air Europa. “We check in passengers and direct them to go to the boarding gates. We can’t do anything else.” he explained.
Victims of the heavy storm that paralyzed air traffic at the airport and flooded the building and its approaches crowded into the terminal. Yesterday was a typical high season day with more than 900 scheduled flights.
Santiago Sanchez and his family landed “at 12:40 hours. We came from Madrid, my parents arrived from Panama”, he said. The plan was to pick up their rental car and head to the hotel. The reason for the trip to Mallorca is that they are coming to a wedding. “My wife, my father and my brother have gone to pick up the car and have been locked in the parking lot for three and a half hours.”
“The cars couldn’t get out.”explained the Panamanian while he waited for his turn accompanied by his mother to take a cab in the endless queue in the arrivals area of Son Sant Joan. The road chaos also took over communications with the airport and long queues formed to access the terminal. His family threw in the towel, unable to return to pick up Santiago and his mother. “Uber doesn’t seem to be working. I tried to book one, but I get unavailable,” Santiago added.
While cabs were scarce at the airport stop, there were plenty of vehicles at the Uber stop.
“We’ll get by.”
The flow of passengers did not cease in the terminal. In the check-in area, with several areas still waterlogged, people were milling around the customer service counters. Whoever was lucky enough to find it. Siblings Ana and Fernando Carreras had their flight to Barcelona with Vueling at 6:40 pm. “We see” on the airline’s app “that it is delayed at 12pm. We are looking for a Vueling counter. My parents are already older and we are traveling with them,” says Ana. “We have already seen that it was all flooded when we arrived at the parking lot. We want to know if we can fly today [por ayer]if not, we will make our own way. For the moment, we don’t know what to do,” explained Fernando.
Another group of travelers on their way to Cologne, Germany had just found out that their flight had been cancelled. Those who could were fleeing from Son Sant Joan.
German Folloneros
Bad luck for the ryanair passengers on the Palma-Valladolid route. The flight was to depart late due to the flight was delayed due to a “disturbance” caused by some German passengers (the aircraft had previously flown to a German destination), which even required the presence of the Civil Guard. For this reason, the passengers on their way to Valladolid were caught at the beginning of the storm inside the plane and had to spend three hours locked inside “without eating anything”, said one of the affected passengers.
In the arrivals area, the worker at the Aena information service point kept giving the same instructions. A continuous trickle of people was coming out of the doors of the baggage claim area. They were passengers who had checked in their bags and after passing the security check had been waiting in the boarding lounges. Faced with the collapse of Son Sant Joan, with operations paralyzed for part of the afternoon, with no landings or takeoffs, they had to go to pick up their luggage at the conveyor belts due to the cancellation of their flights. They asked for information on how to get to the departures area and find their airlines’ offices.
This was the case of Iñaki Añorejea, who accompanied by his wife and son was on his way to Bilbao. “We were starting our vacation,” he recounted. “Let’s see what Vueling tells us.” And so were hundreds of travelers wandering through an airport that had been submerged in water.
Outside, the rains also wreaked havoc. In the employee parking lot the water was knee-high, while the runway was transformed into a river area. The baggage storage area near the runway was also affected.
The Aemet forecast had activated the orange alert for heavy rains from four o’clock in the afternoon in Palma, the interior and south of Mallorca, with intensities of 40 liters per square meter per hour. But the agency itself was already warning at two o’clock in the afternoon that the orange alert was brought forward.
The storm stopped over Son Sant Joan and discharged violently over that specific area, but not beyond.
It so happened that at the Son Bonet aerodrome the rains only discharged 11.6 liters per square meter, 3.6 liters at the UIB campus and 1.2 liters at Portopí.
Until 16:30 hours the record at Palma airport and its surroundings amounted to 71.8 liters per square meter.
As IB3 meteorologist Miquel Salamanca recalled, the airport of Palma has beaten its record of rain in a month of June. The previous record of 55.9 liters per square meter was set on June 2, 1991.
At around nine o’clock at night the firefighters were still working in the parking lot of the workers of Son Sant Joan.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.