Schiphol's safety measures can't keep up with explosive growth, Safety Board stresses

In the discussion about the future of Schiphol airport, the importance of safety is "insufficiently weighed against the other interests that are involved with the airport", the Dutch Safety Board stressed in a press release on Wednesday, NOS reports.

Last year the Dutch Safety Board released an extensive report in which it stated that Schiphol can only continue growing if the safety risks are structurally reduced. The Safety Board is annoyed about how Schiphol and the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management responded to this report, and therefore issued this press release, according to NOS.

The Safety Board wrote that the Ministry and Schiphol are using this report to emphasize that Schiphol is safe. "By doing so they ignore the conclusion that the limits of what can be handled safely at Schiphol are coming into view. This unilateral emphasis of the sector and the ministry on a 'safe' Schiphol does not do justice to the safety concerns describe by the Dutch Safety Board in the report."

According to the Safety Board, it is time for a fundamental discussion about the future of the airport. "At Schiphol a pattern is visible that the parties involved first accept new safety risks and then take measures to limit the negative consequences for safety. That approach must be broken."