A worker carries a suitcase into the "luggage factory", where the luggage of athletes for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games will be collected, is seen at Charles de Gaulle Airport, in Roissy-en-France, north of Paris, Tuesday, April 23, 2024 in Paris. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
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Officials at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport on Tuesday unveiled a new baggage security system and a dedicated baggage handling area ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris.
The new equipment includes an updated scanner system that allows for a more detailed scan of passengers’ luggage, so travelers don’t have to remove items such as electronic devices, aerosols or liquids from their bags.
“If we have doubts about a piece of luggage, the luggage doesn’t go,” said Edward Arkwright, CEO of Aeroports de Paris Group, the body that manages Paris’s airports. “We prefer that an athlete leaves without any baggage than that he leaves (with something) questionable.”
As the first gateway to the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Charles de Gaulle Airport expects to handle more than 114,000 bags of delegations and media and receive an estimated 47,000 sports items.
The airport also unveiled the “luggage factory,” a dedicated 10,000-square-foot facility for processing the equipment and luggage of the athletics delegations leaving the airport after the closing ceremony.
“The biggest challenge is the oversized luggage,” said Sebastien Malaussene, the airport’s project manager. “Athletes travel with all their sports equipment and are not the average passenger who takes four to five bags. They have sports equipment, many of which are oversized.”
