Istanbul, (Samajweekly) The Istanbul Airport in Turkey has been redesigning its daily practices to offer a “healthy and safe travel experience” in the post-coronavirus pandemic era, it revealed on Tuesday.
The management said in a statement that a series of strict rules covering the entire process of travel that begins with the entrance to the airport and continues until the plane takes off were redefined, reports Xinhua news agency.
“First of all, only passengers with a flight ticket and working personnel will be granted access to the airport,” the statement said, noting that body temperatures will be screened by thermal cameras at the entrance.
Passengers and personnel without masks will be denied access to the terminal and on the plane, according to the rules.
All staff members who will work in close contact with passengers and baggage will have to wear full protective gear, including masks, gloves, full face visors or protective glasses, protective headgear, and overalls, the statement continued.
Passengers will be required to fill out “passenger information forms” to be delivered to health officers for proper passenger tracking and every single flight that lands at the airport will be tracked by the Health Ministry, it added.
Additionally, social distancing rules and sterilization activities will be among the most significant measures that will be maintained in every zone in the terminal, according to the airport management.
All seating combinations across the terminal have been rearranged to maintain the social distancing, the statement said, adding that the products at the food court will be sold in disposable packaging, menus will be digitalized, and contact-free payment systems will be introduced.
The Istanbul Airport served 64 million passengers over the last year after it became fully operational in April 2019.
As part of the measures taken by the country’s authorities, flag carrier Turkish Airlines, and other companies earlier grounded all their international and domestic flights to curb the spread of the pandemic.
The Turkish government has recently introduced a normalization process to ease the coronavirus restrictions, but it was still not clear when the ban on air travel will be lifted.
Turkey reported 139,771 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 3,841 deaths.
