IT WAS déjà vu Monday when the country’s main airport was again hit by a power outage on a major holiday, causing travel disruption exactly four months after the New Year’s Day fiasco that inconvenienced travelers returning to work from a long break.
In a press briefing on Monday afternoon, Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) General Manager Cesar Chiong said more than 40 flights had been cancelled or delayed, affecting 9,000 passengers after a power outage hit the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 3 at dawn Monday, May 1, 2023.
Monday, May 1, was the Labor Day holiday, extending the weekend to three days.
In the same briefing, Xander Lao, president and chief commercial officer of Cebu Pacific Air, said the cancellation was done by the airport authorities to decongest and reduce the influx of stranded passengers at the check-in and pre-departure areas.
The airline promised the passengers with cancelled flights that they could seek a refund, rebook or reschedule to a later day their flights for free.
At the Mactan-Cebu International Airport, at least 25 flights had been delayed or cancelled as of 2 p.m. as a result of the NAIA outage.
In a statement earlier in the day, the MIAA, operator of the NAIA, said the standby power was supplying electricity to critical facilities in the airport, especially the computer systems of airlines, as well as immigration to continue processing both inbound and outbound passengers.
According to Manila Electric Company (Meralco) engineer Noel Espiritu, the power outage was caused by either faulty wiring or a short circuit, which resulted in a high amount of power current and fault indicator.
He added that they are still looking more into the cause of the power interruption.
As of 12:30 p.m., among the canceled flights at the NAIA 3 were 48 Cebu Pacific flights from Manila to Tuguegarao, Daraga, Cagayan, Cauayan, Dipolog, Puerto Princesa, Caticlan, Cebu, Panglao, Bacolod, Davao, Butuan, Zamboanga, General Santos, Ozamiz, Caticlan, Iloilo, Tacloban, Cotabato, Pagadian, Dumaguete and vice versa.
AirAsia Philippines also announced changes in some of its flights, including one bound for Cebu from Manila whose estimated time of departure was moved to 2 p.m.
In Cebu, 25 flights to and from Manila had been delayed or cancelled as of 2 p.m.
Mary Ann Dimabayao, public information officer of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport Authority, said Cebu Pacific was the most affected airline, having the most flight routes inside the NAIA Terminal 3.
No protocol
Sheena Marione Gutierrez, a passenger whose flight was delayed by the power outage, expressed her concerns regarding the lack of protocol for the NAIA personnel in responding to a power outage.
“I was at NAIA Terminal 3 at 11:45 p.m. on April 30 to make sure I will be able to catch my flight the next day. However, because of the ‘power outage,’ the operations in receiving check-in baggage were halted, and resumed at a later time manually,” Gutierrez said.
In her Facebook post, she questioned why an international airport has no “Plan B” in case of a power outage. She observed that there was no standard protocol in managing crowds after the power was temporarily lost.
Gutierrez’s domestic flight scheduled for Davao City International Airport (DCIA) at 6:05 a.m. was delayed for another couple of hours.
“Even when we were boarding already, I had no idea what time our flight would be. It took us almost two hours to wait inside the aircraft before it decided to leave, and we reached Davao Airport by 12:12 p.m.,” she said.
Aside from the delayed flight, Gutierrez said her luggage did not fly with them, so they had to wait another couple of hours at the DCIA to recover their personal belongings.
New Year
Last Jan. 1, a power outage at the NAIA caused an air-traffic glitch that caused hundreds of domestic and international flights to be canceled or delayed. The Civil Aeronautics Board said the hours-long shutdown of the NAIA cost the airlines at least P100 million after it left thousands of passengers stranded.