KAIA still crowded with Umrah pilgrims

With expansion well under way in July 2008, many thought that King Abdul Aziz International Airport (KAIA) was going to rank alongside international airports in Europe such as Charles De Gaulle in France.
Sadly, the situation has remained the same, with the airport still struggling with overcrowding and congestion caused mainly by thousands of Umrah pilgrims.
Every nook and cranny of the airport's northern lounge is used by young and old pilgrims to bed down to sleep or just lie down to rest surrounded by their bags and belongings.
Even the prayer room is turned into a sleeping area, after the chairs and seats are occupied the airport terminal.
Khalid Al-Harbi, director of the Department of Haj and Umrah at KAIA, said more than 1,961 planes arrived at the airport in March carrying 357,000 pilgrims, fewer than the same period last year when 2,675 flights arrived carrying 459,000 pilgrims.
He said his department withdrew all flights for Umrah trips from the Haj lounge to avoid overcrowding, and left the north lounge for scheduled flights carrying pilgrims, but this evidently did not work.
Arab News reported recently that over 40 percent of the work has been completed on the expansion project, which will eventually cost SR 27 billion.