Airports in Rotterdam and Eindhoven can only take over a few Schiphol flights

The second and third largest airports in the Netherlands, located in Eindhoven and Rotterdam, have very little remaining capacity to take over flights from Schiphol Airport between now and the end of October. Schiphol announced new capacity restrictions which could cut the average number of departing passengers by 18 percent.

The slots at Rotterdam The Hague Airport will be completely filled up in the coming weeks. Eindhoven Airport only has a few available, said Dutch airport slot coordinator ACNL.

Eindhoven Airport said it is in talks with Schiphol about how the regional airport can help. "We've had requests for help before, but to date, our offer has never been taken up," said a spokesperson. Depending on the day, up to two slots are available, she said.

There is more space at Groningen Airport Eelde to take over flights, said the airport’s CEO, Meiltje de Groot. "But the airlines decide." The airport is also in talks, as Schiphol had already asked De Groot’s airport for help.

According to ACNL director Hugo Thomassen, if airlines want to relocate flights they also face the challenge of finding enough staff for baggage handling. Travel agency TUI was among the companies which said they were already working on scenarios in which flights are moved to other airports. This also happened regularly last summer, when Schiphol also set a maximum number of passengers.

Schiphol confirmed Friday that it will reduce the daily number of locally departing passengers by an average of 18 percent until at least the end of October. Companies still do not know what the exact consequences of the decision will be. Like over the summer, that calculation will be made by ACNL, and will be revealed early next week.

The slot coordinator said that Schiphol has yet to report exactly how many passengers are allowed to depart each day. The airport has so far only communicated an average. Once ACNL has received more specific figures, it will start calculating reductions per day and company.

Also like last summer, the largest operators will have to give up the most seats. For KLM, this will be about half of the average daily reduction of 9,250 passengers departing from Schiphol. Transavia and easyJet also operate many flights from Schiphol.

Airlines can achieve the reduction in the number of seats by freezing ticket sales, merging flights, relocating flights, or cancelling trips. More information about this will be announced next week.