Dublin Airport Evacuation Alarms Cause Chaos After PA System Malfunctions

Chaos ensued at the Dublin Airport, Ireland, after a public address system in the facility malfunctioned, making it stuck on the evacuation mode when there was no actual emergency in the airport.

“There is a fault with our PA system at our Pier 1 gates @DublinAirport. The system is stuck on evacuation mode. There is NO evacuation of this area. Our sound engineers are currently investigating,” the airport clarified via a tweet on social media.

Evacuation alarms started to go off around 6:30 a.m. local time (1:30 a.m. EDT) in Terminal One of the airport, resulting in hundreds of confused passengers making their way out of the airport.

A number of travelers also took to social media to express their frustration at the lack of information regarding the evacuation from the airport officials.

"Alarms going off in Dublin Airport saying to evacuate. Nobody moving, not even staff look bothered. Nice if someone announced what's happening,” Twitter user Neill Hill who was present at the facility at the time of the incident wrote, while another user tweeted, “Evacuation in Dublin Airport T1 complete chaos."

Yet another Twitter user posted a video of the chaotic situation at the terminal. A crowd of uncertain passengers are seen standing at the airport, not sure whether to evacuate or not.

Last year, the Dublin Airport was evacuated after fire broke out in one of the offices inside the facility. The evacuation orders were part of a safety measure as the fire crews tackled the blaze.

In a statement to Independent at the time, the airport said: "The Pier 3 boarding gate facility was temporarily evacuated at about 9.30 a.m. (local time, 4:30 a.m. EDT) this morning due to small fire in an office which is separate from the public areas of the pier. The fire was quickly extinguished and no one injured. As a precautionary measure, security screening was suspended for about 12 minutes in Terminal 1.”