Tan Son Nhat Airport is gearing up for the peak New Year holiday season | community

HCM City (VNS/VNA) – Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City saw a surge in travel volume as people travel for the New Year holidayswhich take place between 31 December 2022 and 2 January 2023.

The airport is expected to handle 720 flights and up to 115,000 passengers on the peak day of December 31. This is the highest daily number of passengers since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in April 2021.

Of this quantity passengersinternational arrivals are expected to increase to more than 37,000 per day.

Nguyen Nam Tien, deputy director of Tan Son Nhat International Airport, said the airport has prepared plans to meet the upcoming high demand.

All units were asked to pay attention to monitoring the flight schedule, frequency and density of flight operations in each time frame and organize staff to ensure airport services.

Airlines and ground handling units were required to increase staff to guide and assist passengers in an attempt to prevent flight delays.

Aviation security will pay special attention to the security area in Concourse B in the early morning of 31 December 2022 to avoid congestion.

Vietnam’s Civil Aviation Authority said it will strengthen aviation security controls to Level 1 for the upcoming holidays.

Under Level 1 aviation security controls, people will not be allowed to enter the restricted area to pick up and drop off passengers, and ID checks and personal interviews when carrying out aviation security procedures will be strengthened. Passengers will be required to remove their shoes and coats and place them through the X-ray machine.

Airport security will randomly screen 15% of passengers who pass through the magnetic door without triggering the alarm and 15% of carry-on and checked baggage that has been X-rayed without suspicious images.

Aviation security surveillance cameras will increase surveillance in various areas of the airport and daily reports will be sent to the Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam.

According to Tien, Tan Son Nhat International Airport is likely to receive the highest number of passengers in four years during the peak of the Lunar New Year (Tet) Festival.

Around 820 flights with 130,000 passengers expected to depart from and arrive at the airport per day.

Passenger numbers are expected to be the busiest over two days – nearly 123,000 on January 20, 2023 and more than 144,000 on January 29, 2023, when people return to their hometowns before Tet and head back to HCM City after the Tet holiday.

The airport is expected to welcome more than 3.8 million passengers with nearly 27,000 flights during the holiday, which is an increase of nearly 10% compared to the same period in 2019/.