New Terminal Fiasco

[macahoom]

Landed at Phuket International this morning at 7.20am.

 

To our surprise the plane taxied to the new terminal. (We were out of Phuket for six weeks.) Today is opening day and the PM is supposedly coming for a ribbon cutting ceremony.

 

Followed the signs for TAXI - gates 5 and 6. When we walked out of those gates there was nothing.

 

Walked over to where everyone was gathering with their suitcases. Lots of people sitting/standing about. No one seemed to know how to get a meter taxi. My girlfriend asked lots of people, both uniformed and not. Eventually a couple of girls who worked for a shuttle bus offered to shuttle us over to the old terminal for free. 

 

When we eventually got a taxi, the driver told us no one knows what is going on.

 

No taxis at the new terminal, but lots of faux green grass to sit on.

 

 

[Lamkyong]

just teething ploblem    no wolly  you just walk bi pen rai

[Old Croc]

Apart from no taxis outside, how was the processing and baggage collection inside?

[macahoom]

14 minutes ago, Old Croc said:

Apart from no taxis outside, how was the processing and baggage collection inside?

 

To be honest, I wasn't paying much attention. We'd been in the air for 23 and a half hours (plus an eight and a half hour and a three hour wait in airports) and I was feeling pretty tired.

 

Immigration had quite a lot of desks but only a few were manned; four or five, I think. There was no sign up for Thai passport holders so we went to one that had a Crew sign - no problem.

 

When we arrived at the carousel, the bags were already there! And we had gone through immigration very quickly. Unheard of in Phuket, in my experience.

 

Customs seemed to be putting on a bit of a show, checking more bags than I've ever seen before.

 

The terminal itself is not quite finished. But even so, I was surprised at how swish it looks for Phuket. 

 

 

[stevenl]

4 minutes ago, macahoom said:

 

To be honest, I wasn't paying much attention. We'd been in the air for 23 and a half hours (plus an eight and a half hour and a three hour wait in airports) and I was feeling pretty tired.

 

Immigration had quite a lot of desks but only a few were manned; four or five, I think. There was no sign up for Thai passport holders so we went to one that had a Crew sign - no problem.

 

When we arrived at the carousel, the bags were already there! And we had gone through immigration very quickly. Unheard of in Phuket, in my experience.

 

Customs seemed to be putting on a bit of a show, checking more bags than I've ever seen before.

 

The terminal itself is not quite finished. But even so, I was surprised at how swish it looks for Phuket. 

 

 

So all in all besides the lack of taxi's it was a good experience.

[xvend]

left for 6 weeks, came back, and whinge on the day the PM was arriving. Hope you enjoyed your time off from Phuket

[federicoP]

So, for the moment, except for the meter taxi issue, it does not look a "fiasco".

 

I think that many times we are too fast to criticize Thailand and its people, regardless......

[Psimbo]

Fiasco-  'a thing that is a complete failure, especially in a ludicrous or humiliating way'.

 

Experience at Phuket Airport- 'most things went well but minor glitch when it came to transport'.

 

Methinks someone should invest in a thesaurus!

Edited September 17, 2016 by Psimbo

[eisfeld]

With the PMs oppinion on the taxi mafia, I'm not surprised that all these fellows are staying far, far away from him

 

Unfortunately it means there is no single taxi left in Phuket that could serve there

[madmitch]

Anyone used it to fly out yet? Still awaiting reports.

[Xircal]

I can't understand how the new terminal is going to double pax numbers from 6.5 million to 12.5 million. After all, the airport still only has one runway and only so many flights can land and take off at any given time.

 

The only way around that problem at the moment would be to extend night time arrivals and departures but those would be limited to domestic flights I would have thought.

 

[GiantFan]

7 hours ago, Xircal said:

I can't understand how the new terminal is going to double pax numbers from 6.5 million to 12.5 million. After all, the airport still only has one runway and only so many flights can land and take off at any given time.

 

The only way around that problem at the moment would be to extend night time arrivals and departures but those would be limited to domestic flights I would have thought.

 

Many flights from the land of Chins arrive past midnight and depart 3 to 4 in the morning.  This helps to spread the load.  This AM as an example, 6 to 9 am, 11 departures / 8 arrivals.   19 over 3 hrs isn't that much.  Every 10 minutes.  Changes throughout the day / years obviously.

 

The new terminal and renovated old terminals brings the design capacity to 12.5 million.  We are at that number now, so old terminals were at 2x design capacity.