{"id":17974,"date":"2026-07-22T02:30:46","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T02:30:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/passenger-takes-3-hours-to-depart-as-delays-spiral-out-of-control-greek-city-times\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T02:30:46","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T02:30:46","slug":"passenger-takes-3-hours-to-depart-as-delays-spiral-out-of-control-greek-city-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/passenger-takes-3-hours-to-depart-as-delays-spiral-out-of-control-greek-city-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Passenger Takes 3 Hours to Depart as Delays Spiral Out of Control \u2013 Greek City Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-first=\"A\">\n<h4 id=\"h-athens-international-airport-eleftherios-venizelos-is-facing-major-operational-problems-with-widespread-delays-turning-departures-into-long-ordeals-for-passengers\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Athens International Airport \u201cEleftherios Venizelos\u201d is facing major operational problems, with widespread delays turning departures into long ordeals for passengers.<\/h4>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On July 21, most flights \u2014 both arrivals and departures \u2014 ran significantly behind schedule. Many travelers were stuck waiting for one to three hours or more.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"instagram-media\" data-instgrm-captioned=\"\" data-instgrm-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DbA-_5qzzS4\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" data-instgrm-version=\"14\" style=\" background:#FFF; border:0; border-radius:3px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width:540px; min-width:326px; padding:0; width:99.375%; width:-webkit-calc(100% - 2px); width:calc(100% - 2px);\"\/>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Nathan<\/strong>, an Australian traveler and follower of Greek City Times, shared video footage as he was leaving Greece. He told us it took him <strong>nearly 3 hours<\/strong> to finally get out of the airport.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThis is one of the worst departure experiences I\u2019ve had from Athens,\u201d Nathan said.<\/p>\n<h3 id=\"h-record-traffic-straining-the-system\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Record Traffic Straining the System<\/h3>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to Eurocontrol, Greece ranks among the worst countries in Europe for flight delays, recording a <strong>63% increase<\/strong> compared to last year. The main causes are capacity limitations and chronic staffing shortages in air traffic control.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On July 18, Greek airspace handled a record <strong>5,082 flights<\/strong> in a single day \u2014 the highest daily total ever recorded.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The delays created a domino effect, particularly during evening hours. For example, between 18:00\u201319:00 on July 21, only 7 out of 24 arriving flights were on time, while all departures were delayed.<\/p>\n<h3 id=\"h-efforts-to-improve\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Efforts to Improve<\/h3>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In response to the crisis, the Hellenic Civil Aviation Authority swore in <strong>45 new air traffic controllers<\/strong> on July 20. However, with peak summer traffic expected to continue through August and early September, significant delays are likely to persist.<\/p>\n<footer class=\"article-tags entry-footer\">\n<div>\n\t\t<strong>Tags:<\/strong><br \/>\n\t\tAir traffic control, airport delays, Athens airport, Athens Airport Chaos, Eleftherios Venizelos, Eurocontrol, Flight Delays Greece, Greek airports, Hellenic Civil Aviation Authority, Nathan Traveller, Summer Travel 2026\t<\/div>\n<\/footer><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/greekcitytimes.com\/2026\/07\/22\/athens-airport-delays-chaos-3-hour-departure\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Athens International Airport \u201cEleftherios Venizelos\u201d is facing major operational problems, with widespread delays turning departures into long ordeals for passengers. On July 21, most flights \u2014 both arrivals and departures \u2014 ran significantly behind schedule. Many travelers were stuck waiting for one to three hours or more. Nathan, an Australian traveler and follower of Greek &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Passenger Takes 3 Hours to Depart as Delays Spiral Out of Control \u2013 Greek City Times\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/passenger-takes-3-hours-to-depart-as-delays-spiral-out-of-control-greek-city-times\/#more-17974\" aria-label=\"Read more about Passenger Takes 3 Hours to Depart as Delays Spiral Out of Control \u2013 Greek City Times\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17975,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/greekcitytimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/airport-1_upscale.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","no-featured-image-padding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}