Record numbers stretch airport

Newman Airport is struggling to cope under the weight of record monthly passenger numbers.

More than 35,000 passengers passed through the airport in May, 14,000 more than the same time last year and double that of 2009, the year the terminal opened.

Shire of East Pilbara manager of airport services Leon Burger said airport facilities and staff were fighting a losing battle.

“At peak times on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings there can be between 600 to 700 people in the building, not just passengers but staff and girlfriends and mothers seeing them off,” he said.

“The terminal was not designed for this number of people.

“It’s designed to accommodate 200 outgoing passengers and 200 incoming passengers.

“I feel embarrassed that they have to stand outside in temperatures of up to 48 degrees in summer because our facilities can’t keep up.”

Mr Burger said the few staff that had not already been lured to the mining industry were constantly under pressure.

“We are struggling like hell to keep people, there is no accommodation and we can’t compete with mining salaries,” he said.

“For the check-in staff to check them all in and then process them through security and load the bags is extremely difficult to do.”

According to Mr Burger, it would be possible to process up to 1.3 million passengers a year if the airport was operating on a 16- hour day. He had asked companies in the resources sector about the possibility of changing their rostering schedules to spread out the concentration of passengers, but with no success.

“As a public airport we can function perfectly fine, this demand is purely resource-based and they need to foot the bill,” he said.

Shire of East Pilbara president Lynne Craigie agreed, saying not only should resource companies be held accountable, but the Federal and State Government too.

“We built the terminal with the opinion it would last years, and the cost to extend it again is huge,” she said.

Mr Burger said there was no way the Shire could have predicted such rapid growth when the terminal was first designed.

He said the cost to immediately resolve the congestion issue and increase the apron to accommodate five aircraft instead of three was about $60 million.

In the short-term, a plan to expand the departure lounge and add two more check-in counters is in the works.