The opening of a new check-in facility at Dublin airport has been further postponed until Monday at the earliest after day-long talks between Siptu and Aer Lingus representatives yesterday.
The new Area 14 was due to open last Tuesday. However, Siptu has raised a number of health and safety issues about the new basement facility.
A spokesperson for Aer Lingus said the Health and Safety Authority inspected the new facility yesterday.
Siptu shop stewards, who represent about 400 operatives, will meet this morning to discuss the new safety report with a view to opening the facility on Monday.
The new area, which is situated below the arrivals area, is designed to ease congestion at the airport in advance of the opening of Pier D and Terminal 2. Area 14 can handle up to four million passengers annually, or 11,000 a day and it was initially expected to be operational in April.
Construction of the facility was completed before last Christmas and the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) has been seeking a tenant since. It is understood that Aer Lingus made a late approach to use Area 14 after talks between the DAA and Ryanair broke down. The DAA was considering moving long-haul operators from the US and the Middle East into the facility.
As part of its takeover of Area 14, Aer Lingus is relocating a large number of its self-service check-in kiosks. Aer Lingus handles about six million departing passengers from Dublin each year but some of these will continue to use the airline's existing check-in facilities.
Passengers will access Area 14 through the arrivals area, check in and then travel up two floors to departures.
