Fourth postponement of Berlin’s new Brandenburg Airport opening

Continued technical problems continue to dog the opening of Berlin’s new Brandenburg airport, meaning that the already three-times delayed opening will be delayed a fourth time and will not happen in 2017. The problems appear to remain connected with the smoke extraction system. According to Airportzentrale.de: “there are problems with several hundred doors and the sprinkler system,” and “only 20 per cent of the 1,400 doors work flawlessly.”
The publication also stated that “In an emergency [test] it was found that the doors would not close and the sprinkler system would not start.
“It almost sounds like a bad joke. Both problems are directly related to the smoke extraction system which has already caused problems.
“An airport opening in 2017 moves into the far distance.”
Originally it was estimated the airport would be open in 2011 and according to Thelocal.de, Karl Muhlenfeld, who is responsible for the new airport project, had previously indicated that should the 2017 deadline not be met, the airport would not be open before the Spring of 2018.
An additional problem with these delays is that of capacity. The 2011 opening was intended to coincide with the closure of the city’s two smaller airports, Tegel and Schonefeld. However the boom in low-cost airlines has seen passenger numbers grow substantially, while the city has also become an extremely popular travel destination for international visitors.
With combined passenger numbers for the two airports likely to exceed 32 million for 2016, this would mean that were Tegel and Schonefeld airports to close, Brandenburg airport would be at full capacity from day one. When construction work began ten years ago, combined passenger numbers totalled 18.5 million.