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WEATHER

Passengers wait out airport delays

An estimated 6,000 to 7,000 passengers have been affected by delays at Stockholm's Arlanda Airport on Monday as a major snow storm hit the capital and left only one runway in use.

Passengers wait out airport delays

The majority of flights are delayed by around two hours, though the airport is urging passengers to arrive on time for their scheduled flights unless advised otherwise by their airline.

Up to date departure and arrival times can be found at the airport’s website.

The situation at the airport remained calm on Monday afternoon with most people sitting in the cafes and restaurants and waiting out the delay.

The general attitude is stoical, and most passengers The Local spoke to were not blaming the airport authorities.

“I’m delayed by two hours – so far – and there’s not much to do. I’m just having a sandwich, making a couple of calls and am planning on starting my laptop in a minute. I’m not too irritated,” said Lennart Christensson, flying to Berlin with Air Berlin on business for his company Transmotec, an electronics component company.

“When there’s so much snow, combined with wind, then this sort of thing happens. It would have been impractical to always have enough ground staff on standby to prevent it.”

“There are too few places to sit and work, but that’s the same in airports all over the world. They could have made internet connections free, though – that’s the least an airport can do in situations like this.”

Papa Ibrahima Diallo sat with his family outside a bookshop in Terminal 2 while waiting for a flight to Paris with Norwegian.

“We’re supposed to be flying at 13.30 and we’re officially half an hour delayed, but it might be more as we still haven’t got a gate. All you can do it wait and drink coffee. My son is just a toddler, but so far he’s doing OK.”

Sara from Uppsala, flying to Paris with SAS, said she was “a bit stressed” from standing around and watiing.

“We drove here from Uppsala, which was awful – we were doing 40-50 km/h all the way and could barely see the road. I was supposed to fly at 11.25, but so far I’ve been 2 hours delayed. What makes it worse is that they give so little information – you need to look the whole time. But I’m not cross – I know it’s down to the weather.”

TRAVEL NEWS

Aarhus Airport to get easier connections with new code-sharing deal

Passengers travelling from Aarhus Airport using Scandinavian airline SAS are likely to find more convenient onwards connections from September.

Aarhus Airport to get easier connections with new code-sharing deal

Convenient connections to European hub airports in Amsterdam and Paris will become easier to find from Aarhus Airport from September.

A code-sharing agreement between Scandinavian airline SAS and Air France, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and Delta Air Lines means that flight codes from those airlines – and more efficient connections via Copenhagen – will appear at Aarhus, the Jutland airport said in a press release on Tuesday.

The agreement gives Aarhus Airport passengers access to over 1,000 European destinations through so-called SkyTeam network.

For example, the code-sharing networks cuts journey times from Aarhus (via Copenhagen) to Amsterdam Schiphol to 2 hours 50 minutes, and to Paris CDG to 3 hours and 50 minutes.

“We are becoming more global. With only 30 minutes’ driving time from Aarhus, people in the region can save a huge amount of time flying from Aarhus Airport to an impressive number of Air France, KLM or SkyTeam destinations,” the airport’s director Lotta Sandsgaard said in the press release.

The agreement “has great significance for the international business environment in the Aarhus region and in a tourism perspective for a booming sector by attracting travellers from European and overseas markets,” she added.

The SK flight code, one of the codes which will be used at Aarhus under the agreement, is operated by Air France and KLM from their respective hubs. This means destinations including Marseille, Bordeaux, Nantes, Porto, Newcastle, Southampton, Cardiff, Venice and Naples as well as Marrakesh, Tunis and Casablanca in North Africa can be booked.

Destinations including Las Vegas, Denver, Seattle, Orlando, Cincinnati, Montreal, Vancouver, Detroit and Salt Lake City and more can also be booked with Air France and KLM to and from Aarhus Airport.

Travellers in Aarhus will also see new connections between SAS and Delta-operated flights to dozens of destinations across the USA and Canada via Delta’s North American network. The deal means they can travel to these destinations with one check-in at Aarhus Airport’s SAS counter.

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