JAKARTA Some 4.000 passengers are still waiting to be transported at the Soekarno-Hatta international airport west of Jakarta. They have arrived since last morning and most of them are transit passengers. Unfortunately there is no information whatsoever about their departure yet. Nothing is sure at the moment. “The strange thing is that the employees of the airlines and airport have already gone. Where did they all go?” is what Prasetyo asks himself.

Prasetyo is one of the passengers at the airport. He has been waiting there since 14:00 local time (GMT+7) yesterday afternoon when his plane, GA 214 (Garuda Indonesia) should have departed. But he noticed that flight GA 212 didn’t depart yet as well, let alone GA 216, which is after GA 214. Now there is only one plane per hour that leaves from the airport.

According to Prasetyo, the situation at the airport is no different than when having to find an emergency shelter after a flooding at the pavement. This is caused by the huge number of passengers. All alleys are full of passengers trying to catch some sleep in one way or another. In Terminal 2, from doors F1 to F7, all waiting area’s are overloaded. People there are still waiting as well and they don’t have any information about when they are going to be transported from the airport. What needs attention is that the passengers are getting hungry, because the restaurants were closed overnight.

“Sad to see that there is no initiative from people at the airport at all,” said Prasetyo. The passengers have already paid 30.000 Rupiah in airport tax as well. The check-in counters have already been taken over by passengers because there is no staff anymore. For the passengers at the airport there is no choice. The way back to Jakarta is severely flooded and most people are just transfer passengers waiting for their next plane to catch.