Suspected gas leak causes chaos at Australian Airport

A suspected gas leak at an Australian airport resulted in over 24 passengers falling ill. On receiving reports of a mysterious odour, Authorities went to investigate the check-in area in Sydney’s domestic departure hall. The odour was reported around 7.30 p.m. Keeping in mind the safety of the passengers, authorities moved 200 employees and travelers to another part of the airport.

However, a short time later, the odour was reported from a section in the international terminal. This prompted the airport authorities to move 700 people from the section to another part of the airport.

Out of the twenty-seven people affected, two were police officers. The affected were treated by paramedics and suffered several symptoms such as nausea, cough and irritation in the tongue and back of their throats.

In spite an investigation conducted by the NSW fire brigade, the cause of this incident remained unidentified.

In addition to this, passengers were affected by more delays as the Jetstar computer based check in failed in airports all over the country. An IT outage was responsible for the failure of the check-in systems. The failure was reported at 4 am and the crew had to carry out manual check-ins until a backup system was installed at 7 am.

Simon Westerway, spokesman for Jetstar reported that over two dozen flights were delayed across Australia for over an hour and a half till the problem was solved. Jetstar has said it regrets the delay caused at peak time on Monday morning and they have switched systems to a new platform.