Security queues at Dublin airport

Sarsfield

Has anyone been through Dublin on an early weekday flight recently? What's the queue for security like.

I've an 07:20 flight in the morning. Last month I arrived nice and early for my flight and found no queue whatsoever, but I haven't been through the airport so early since the security issue hit the news.

Any info appreciated!

garthv

Well with all the security scandal going on at the mo and added to the face its June....id suggest going extra early

seamus

Twice I've been through at around 8pm on a Friday night, little to no delays.

Your best bet is to skip breakfast, head along, check in, check what the queues are like, then head up and have your breakfast, come back down in plenty of time.

Alun

My wife travels a lot through the airport on early morning flights, and she reckons be there 1.5 hours before your flight is due to leave to be on the safe side, so that'd make it 5.45 am or thereabouts. It's getting to the time when lots of charter flights are leaving too, full of people who haven't got a clue and slowing the whole thing up.

They're being quite strict at the moment, they're making everyone take off their shoes and belts, but they do seem to have extra staff on compared to what they had previously.

secret_squirrel

It can be bedlam. If you are going with Aer Lingus - use thier fastpass machines to check in and take hand luggage only.

Avoid a belt. Wear slip on shoes.

On really busy times (like 6am last Sat) the queues from the 2 security zones meet in the middle of the airport under the 'V' of the 2 sets of escalators that go up to the food court.

Here's a tip - if the above is the case - they have been 'cherry picking' passengers from the queues and taking them through the staff security gate directly under the escalators. Keep an eye out and if you see this happening tag along - the worst that will happen is that they will send you back to the original queue.

Sarsfield

Thanks.

Yeah, I've been through the airport a couple of times in the last month so I'm prepared for the taking off the shoes thing. But I've managed to avoid peak times up to now.

Sounds like I'll be arriving early again. God I hate getting up at 4:30am I should be in bed now!

DubTony

seamus wrote:

Twice I've been through at around 8pm on a Friday night, little to no delays.

Your best bet is to skip breakfast, head along, check in, check what the queues are like, then head up and have your breakfast, come back down in plenty of time.

Could be risky. My brother did this on the day it all kicked off. He had 80 minutes to spare so went for breakfast. As he went up the escalator there was a queue of about 10 people at security. 30 minutes later he went down but the queue was so long he missed his flight. I would hope that it was just that first day. I've used the airport once since. Long queue but took only 15 minutes to go through.

Some American airports have a seperate security gate for people who are running late. One of the security people comes out and calls flights that are taking off within 30 minutes and those passengers skip the queue. Can you imagine that in Dublin? 5 gates for people who are late and one for everybody else.

saobh_ie

The security hype in the news seems to actually be a bit of a non-issue. peak waiting times at security are thirty minutes on a weekend with all the charters heading out. Maybe fifteen tops during the week.

That said, you can spend an hour and a half queing at check in because your airline won't use the check in desks avalible to them.

The story is that the bedlam a few weeks back was caused my the media giving people 'advice' which resulted in people arriving hours before thier checkin even opened, obstructing people whose checkin was open and thus causing delays and all that madness.

*shrugs*

That said it'd be nice to not have to que at all like the situation a few years back. Roll on the second terminal, pier d, metro link, et al.

secret_squirrel

saobh_ie wrote:

The security hype in the news seems to actually be a bit of a non-issue. peak waiting times at security are thirty minutes on a weekend with all the charters heading out. Maybe fifteen tops during the week.

Where did you get these figures - no way the queues I have seen could be cleared in 15 mins.

having said that the queues I saw at 6am last Sat were gone by 8am so it is only a peak morning flights thing.

Sarsfield

Well, I made my flight!

Arrived good and early at 05:30, checked in in 2 seconds with FastPass!

NO security queue! Quick brekkie in McDonalds (I love the Sausage&Egg McMuffins), and returned to find a small, but fast-growing queue for security. No more than 2 or 3 minutes queueing at about 5:55. But in those couple of minutes the queue had grown quite a bit from what I could see.

Bloody early again and had the paper read before boarding but I'd rather be early than miss my flight.

Victor

Are there restaurants airside? Or just the newsagent type shops (aside from the Street / Duty Free)?

maxheadroom

Victor wrote:

Are their restaurants airside? Or just the newsagent type shops (aside from the Street / Duty Free)?

There's one near the B gates, opposite the pub, after the duty free. Used to be a bewleys, now its something else, but the food is still the same kind of stuff.

Metrobest

Part of the problem, I feel, is that a lot of the airlines have flights departing at 06.30 which causes a blip in the queues at security around that time. Another problem is that the foodhall does not have enough departure screens; that early in the morning it's easy to settle down with a coffee/newspaper and forget that the flight is about to depart!

I experienced even longer queues at Stansted recently, and flights delayed as a result. But at least the security there was more efficient: passengers whose flights were about to depart were escorted into an express queue.

murphaph

maxheadroom wrote:

There's one near the B gates, opposite the pub, after the duty free. Used to be a bewleys, now its something else, but the food is still the same kind of stuff.

Yeah and it's fcuking expensive, moreso than the restaurant upstairs (can't remember the name, the big one) IIRC. They know they're airside and choice is limited. I wonder is the rental higher airside.

secret_squirrel

Also a butlers chocolate cafe there - and a couple of o'briens who sell only prepacked sambos.

Also a couple of wrights of howth's that also sell sambos.

The bar to the right of the B/C gates security also does sambo's.

penexpers

I have been through the airport twice in the past couple of weeks and they seem to have a good handle on the security side of it. The queue, while kind of long, moves fairly rapidly.

fenris

I have begun to wonder if it would be quicker to drive to Shannon than use Dublin airport.
Sometimes it seems to work out very close in terms of travel time from home (Bray) .

I am really getting the feeling that security in dublin is more for show than any other purpose, what is so hard about it?
It is not as if planes fly at random, there is a timetable, 3 747s flying within 30 mins of each other will produce a crowd, it happens pretty much every day, why the disorganised soviet style shuffle, with only half the machines staffed?
Your average gig queue moves people through security faster with a more thorough search, without the aid of scanners.

I often wonder what inspires some of the policies, visions of geriatric ninja grannys slaughtering room fulls of people armed with nothing but a tweezers spring to mind, you have to be careful of those old folks.

Mucco

Why is Dublin airport the only airport I've been in (outside the States) where you have to take off your shoes? I've taken quite a few flights recently, and all the other security people seem able to assess the risk without forcing the passengers to strip.
It's all a complete charade anyway.

M

secret_squirrel

Its because they failed a security audit a coupla months ago.

And yes its pointless - its just there to provide a false sense of confidence to passengers so the media can act all outraged the next time it fails.

If a terrorist is serious about taking out a plane at any airport outside of maybe Israel - it will happen.

Fortunately the number of terrorists who are that 'professional' and that committed seem to be few and far between. Plus Im sure the security services are doing sterling work behind the scenes.