Worst airport you have been in

[disappointed101]

Travelling through BHX this evening. Looks like a building site, no staff to be seen at check in, then a poor guy turns up apologising for lack of staff. Security an absolute mess, lots of staff having a lovely chat whilst the queue moves at a snails pace, nobody taking control. Awful. It’s got to be up with the worst experience I’ve had. Luckily our flight is delayed due to fog, else we wouldn’t have made it. What’s your worst experience in an airport?

Good tip! This may make things more bearable next time.

My experience of flying from Dublin to UK reminded me lots of having lessons in the temporary classroom at school the environment is not really up to the job and everyone is in grim acceptance

Spot on there the staff I have encountered at Newcastle were so kind & friendly when my In Laws flew up to see us, MiL still had a cast on her leg & they made such a fuss of her she was almost in tears of gratitude.

Not really airport but more airstrip related the only time I honestly thought I was going to die taking off was in the mid 90's from Matekane Air Strip
I was working for a medical company at the time.

Leeds Bradford is so ugly but fairly efficient. Manchester T3 depresses me, literally fills me with dread and I just put on some music and close my eyes until take off. T2 is nice since the renovation but the staff in general not so great. Worst airport for arrivals for me is Cancun. Shocking! I had to wait for my sister as she was arriving on a different flight and I was constantly getting shouted by taxi drivers. The baggage reclaim was the dirtiest I’ve ever seen in all my travels . The smell 🤢

Love Gdańsk airport , the toilets in arrivals are the nicest in all of Europe. Clean, calming music, sound of seagulls and just so nice after a flight! The airport is very efficient for both arrivals and departures

Probably means Chambery.

Luxor, when we were stuck there for hours when our plane was cancelled. It's tiny, it had no air conditioning at the time (it may have it by now) and no refreshments apart from rather acidic orange squash. It felt like some exotic form of torture.

I had the problem trying to get out! I kept setting off the alarm and the jumped up little twat was shouting at me and accusing me of having my phone on me despite it being in the tray. The only metal I could think of was my watch and when I went to take it off he glared at me as though I was stupid and wouldn't let me. In the end another agent came over, took my watch off me so I didn't have to put it in a tray and I walked through with no problems. It was getting to the stage I didn't know what to do and I was so grateful to the other agent for actually being polite and helpful

@Illinoise

DH is a pilot and says their air traffic is appallingly rude to British pilots as well,

To be fair JFK ATC, especially the ground controllers, tend to be “short” with almost all nationalities….it’s a sort of equal opportunities rudeness aimed at the pilots of any aircraft that is not US registered.

Manchester. Overly aggressive staff. Horrible. I will do everything I can to avoid it.

Hurghada. Hideous.

Paris CDG. Absolutely awful for a place as big and well known as Paris, and such a concrete dump.

I find Manchester airport to be fine, even T3. Mind you, have used it countless times so I just kinda stop noticing anything I think

Budapest this year was bloody awful. Packed, scary, rude staff, rude fellow passengers just openly marching to the front of long queues with a smirk. Foreigners treated like cattle and local folk waved to the front

Dubrovnik was small and friendly. We stayed very nearby and it was great watching the planes take off and land from by the pool

Paris Charles De Gaulle - the land of disppearing signs for people commuting between terminals. Vaguely amusing when you know about it in advance and then get to experience it with plenty of time to spare. Incredibly frustrating if you don't.

I think this depends on the airline/terminal as I used to use CDG a lot for work. One terminal is a concrete bus station but I once flew Air France and the terminal for that had free to play playstations, nibbles and luxury shops.

Heathrow followed closely by Manchester.

Salzburg is a shit hole. It's not too bad until you get past security and then you're all rammed into a tiny area with only one extremely overpriced eatery and a shop where you can buy overpriced water and various bits of tat. The toilets stink. Most of the time you end up sitting on the floor because there are so many people.

CDG is dire too. I've transferred there twice. Never again.

Rome Ciampino is awful.

Frankfurt is pretty bad too. Dark, dingy, lacking in signage so it's difficult when you're trying to catch a connecting flight. And queues for the toilets - horrendous!

LAX. Horrendous. Rude people. Soulless. Poorly designed. And it cost me $40 (!!) for 2 vodka and sodas (and this was like 10 years ago, god knows what it would cost now).

Berlin

Manchester. An absolute hellhole made worse by the awful staff.

Another for Burgas in Bulgaria, no luggage carousel, all cases put in coach park, Had to queue for ages for departure. Shambles.
Nova Scotia in January, freezing and deserted, Collected lonely suitcase and waited outside for (booked) taxi.
Gibraltar. Don't remember airport, just landing eeek! All some time ago.

I like Luton

I can't complain when I can park a 2 min walk from the terminal and my flight cost less than a local short return bus fare to my nearest city.

Anywhere is Eastern Europe in the 80s and 90s was fun, usually a very basic shed, squat toilet. snarly men with machine guns, and a huge fug from the smoking allowed everywhere. Many have now simply upgraded to a plastic clad shed, and the smokers moved to outside the main door. The E European officials' charm still as delightful as ever; please and thank you is unheard of, a grunt and point of a gun is as good as you will get.

Oman for a stopover a decade or so ago was awful, refused service at the only cafe I could find as I was female, my male colleagues had no trouble. Recently been through on a stopover and it's been rebuilt and is lovely now.

Honestly I was surprised how crap JFK NYC was. Heathrow is light years ahead in comparison.

Manchester is so bad. Over crowded, no one knows where to go and the security are like employing penguins. Everytime I have flown into Manchester, I have been delayed. Everytime I have flown out I have missed connections due to security taking up to three hours. Awful place.

Santorini. There is no waiting area, it's a cafe opposite the terminal, you have to watch your flight come in then hurry over to catch it.

I completely agree. Awful place.

Traveling alone. Xi'an In the early 90s. Plane to Shanghai was commandeered by the army(?). Had to wait for a coach to take me to a hotel for the night. Wanted to use the toilets but on opening the Ladies section saw the floor was covered in lumps of poo. Decided I would wait.