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northAfter years of delays, the main Berlin-Brandenburg airport became operational. For the official opening of BER, a Lufthansa plane and an Easyjet landed at the new airport on Saturday. The respective heads of the company Carsten Spohr and Johan Lundgren were on board. Actually, the planes were supposed to land in parallel to celebrate the opening day, but that was not possible due to weather conditions. Then they came one after another.
Among others, Brandenburg Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke, Berlin Mayor Michael Müller (both from the SPD), and Federal Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer (CSU) were waiting on the ground. The airport is synonymous with poor planning, oversight failures, and billions of wasting taxpayer money. For this reason too, operators in Berlin, Brandenburg and the federal government are forgoing a noteworthy opening ceremony. “We just opened it,” airport manager Engelbert Lütke Daldrup said repeatedly.
The images of the landing of planes should go around the world more than eight years ago, on June 3, 2012, that is, during the best summer time. The airport management had already invited the opening of the “Willy Brandt” airport in the capital. Flight tickets have long been issued during the summer holidays. Thousands of guests at the party had already presented their holiday dresses when the opening date was canceled on May 8, just four weeks before the planned opening.
Not only the party guests were surprised. For a long time, the airport’s oversight board had also been misled by the fact that most of the construction site traffic lights in management documents were set to “green” and only a few to “yellow.” Suddenly there was a “red” traffic light, especially for the non-functional fire protection system. The authorities pulled the cordon and rejected the airport’s operating permit. The disaster fueled doubts in Germany and the world about German engineering and organizational strength. Managing Director Rainer Schwarz and his CTO Manfred Körtgen had to leave.
Countless changes in plans, extensions and tightening of standards put strain on the main project. In working on the drama, it only gradually emerged that the lack of fire protection was not the only problem at BER. In the hustle and bustle of the last few months before the supposed start, many cables had been run in many wrong channels, a tangle of cables that no one could quickly untangle. The sprinkler system did not work nor did the door control. And then the wrong pins were also installed.
Several CEOs and Air Berlin disappeared
The new chief technology officer, Horst Amann, drew up a long list of thousands of bugs. Its managing director, former railroad director Hartmut Mehdorn, did not like this approach. Several announced opening dates could not be kept. Soon, both managers were no longer on board. Rolls Royce coach Karsten Mühlenfeld was also unable to succeed at BER. After two years at the top, he reached an agreement with the Supervisory Board in the spring of 2017 to terminate his contract.
Not only were the managers lost at the airport in the years after the failed opening, but the main supplier also disappeared: Air Berlin, the airline that wanted to become the best dog in Berlin. Unlike Lufthansa, which remained dependent on Frankfurt and Munich, Air Berlin wanted to establish a hub in BER, especially in the east and southeast direction. But Air Berlin’s business model, the combination of scheduled operations and tourism, did not pay off. The company went bankrupt.
In March 2017, Secretary of State Engelbert Lütke Daldrup of the Berlin Senate Chancellery took the initiative at BER. He had previously represented the country on the supervisory board, a body from which the high political level (former Berlin ruling mayor Klaus Wowereit or Brandenburg Prime Minister Matthias Platzeck, for example) had long since disappeared.
It’s still a grave of millions
Lütke Daldrup set out to work through the list of errors point by point. At the end of 2017, it was aiming for an opening in October 2020. A year ago, Lütke Daldrup confirmed the calendar, in November 2019 it named October 31, 2020 as the opening day. Official flight operations are scheduled to begin on the morning of November 1. The former Tegel Airport in West Berlin will close on 8 November. On that day, an Air France plane will take the last Tegel passengers to Paris.
There will be little going on in BER in the coming weeks and months. Due to the corona pandemic, only a fraction of regular passengers will travel; right now it is one tenth of the 100,000 passengers who get on and off every day in Berlin. This worries management because they, like BER’s airlines, stores and restaurants, will lack revenue. The need for grants for BER remains high, as Lütke Daldrup has already admitted. This year it expects at least 260 million euros, which will have to contribute the shareholders Berlin, Brandenburg and the federal government, that is to say, the taxpayer. Next year it is expected to reach 550 million euros.
