Does your personality change once you reach the airport?

More than half of Britons say they adopt a new identity when they catch a flight, according to a survey by British Airways, which pinpoints five different ‘airport personas’. 

The most common is the Airport Ace, who is ‘fully prepped’ and ‘more likely to take charge of the check-in process’. The rarest airport personality is the Airport Ambler, who doesn’t tend to rush and will likely be the last person to board the plane.

Read on for more on these and the other three personas, as revealed in the BA research… 

AIRPORT ACE

This airport persona is ‘fully prepped and the designated leader when travelling with a group’, the study says.

It continues: ‘They are the most organised and do all the prep for their travel party, probably seen carrying their own perfectly pre-packed liquid bags with spares for the rest of their group.

‘The Airport Ace can’t be missed as they are at the front of the pack, carrying all the group passports and can often be overhead assertively giving directions.’

Almost half (49 per cent) of those surveyed for the study said they consider themselves an ‘Airport Ace’, the most common persona.

In addition, results show that travellers from the East Midlands (59 per cent) are more likely to take charge and adopt this persona.

AIRPORT AUTOPILOT

More than two in five Britons (43 per cent) say they go with the flow ‘on Airport Autopilot’ and are ‘happy to take a back seat and let someone else take charge at the airport’, the research shows.

Those most happy to be led are from the East of England, according to the research, which says these travellers ‘tend to trail at the back, always following directions and don’t often break away’.

It adds: ‘More often than not, they don’t even know where their gate is, as they leave it down to the Airport Ace.’

AIRPORT ATHLETE

Always ‘eyeing up queues’, the Airport Athlete is said to treat the airport ‘like a competitive sport’.

Making up 15 per cent of holidaymakers, this persona strives to be ‘among the first to get on and off the plane and the first to get their baggage after landing’, the study says.

It adds: ‘Airport Athletes can often be spotted darting through the crowds and are constantly on the move, always eyeing up queues trying to work out how to get ahead and spend as little time as possible dwelling in the airport.’

The Airport Athlete persona resonates most with Northern Irish holidaymakers (22 per cent), the findings reveal. 

AIRPORT ADVENTURER

Happy to ‘break away from the pack and spend a lot of time exploring the airport’, you will likely find the Airport Adventurer exploring Duty Free, sampling the restaurants or simply wandering the halls of the airport terminal.

This persona makes up just 8 per cent of travellers, according to the study which says they are ‘most likely to come back with a new gadget from their airport exploration that they didn’t know they needed’.

Describing them as ‘lone wolves’, the study says that Airport Adventurers are ‘not often seen in a group so that they can make the most of the airport without distractions from their travel companions’.

AIRPORT AMBLER 

The least common airport persona of all is the Airport Ambler, accounting for just 4 per cent of travellers.

Those of the ambler persuasion have the most relaxed approach to travel, ‘taking their time to make it to the aircraft and often being among the last people to get onto the plane’, the study says.

It adds: ‘The amblers don’t tend to rush. They are the ones who will stop off for the all-important holiday photo in front of the plane, sometimes holding up the rest of their party.’

Scots are the biggest Airport Amblers, with one in ten saying this persona resonated with them in the study.

BA customer service agent Pauline Price said: ‘Having worked at British Airways for nearly 18 years, I have seen every type of traveller head through the airport, from the ace who takes responsibility and knows where they are headed, to the Airport Autopilot who goes with the flow.

‘We are always on hand to help, but to make it easier for customers, our expert travel teams at British Airways have pulled together a list of everything travellers need to prepare for their trip that can be found on our website and in our new pre-travel email.’

For more visit www.britishairways.com/en-gb/information/before-you-fly. 

Germany reportedly wants the EU to adopt a Rwanda-style migrant system with asylum seekers being deported – similar to Britain’s proposed scheme.

Germany is playing a ‘leading role’ in advocating for a deal with a non-EU state to filter out migrants who do not have much chance of being granted asylum, Die Welt newspaper reported.

Rwanda and Niger are both being considered as partner countries and would be compensated financially for the deal, according to the report.

While Austria and Hungary want asylum seekers to be deported to an African partner country regardless of the country that they came from, Germany is said to want to restrict this process to people who have spent time in the nations they would be exported to, while their application is weighed up.

Backbenchers in the coalition fear that the deal is aimed at deterring refugees from coming to Europe.

This week, 24 MPs from Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats and the Greens signed a letter urging Berlin to stand up for the rights of migrants during the negotiations.

Scholz and interior minister Nancy Faeser are determined to push through a deal, given the increasing numbers of refugee arrivals.

Faeser said: ‘If we fail today or in the next 14 days, it would be a bad signal that would lead to countries isolating themselves. I don’t want that, I want to keep the borders open.’

‘For us in Germany human rights standards are at the forefront, and I will fight hard for that today,’ she added.

The Social Democrats, the biggest party in the coalition with the Greens and Free Democrats, are prepared to put their weight behind changes that would see migrants being detained at the EU’s external borders.

The number of asylum applications in Germany this year has already hit 130,000 and local governments say they have run out of space to hold the new arrivals.

In May, Scholz announced that he would break with the liberal policies he inherited from Angela Merkel and look to reduce numbers using tighter border controls and more money for Frontex, the EU’s border control agency. 

This has led to worries that Scholz could shun fair asylum processes in order to reduce numbers.

The letter from backbenchers stated: ‘We share many people’s concerns that the proposals for a new Common European Asylum System could weaken the right to asylum.’

Separately, 730 Green party members have signed a letter demanding that their leadership change direction.

They said that they were ‘shocked’ by the proposals being negotiated in Brussels, which aim to put in place a new system based on ‘deterrence and exclusion’.

In the UK, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has ordered ministers to begin migrant deportation flights to Rwanda within days of the scheme clearings its legal hurdles.

In a highly unusual move, Sunak has established a Covid-style Cabinet committee to ensure that the Rwanda scheme can ‘hit the ground running’ immediately.

The committee, which has been in place for a month, is already meeting twice a week to ensure there are no barriers to deportation flights beginning as soon as the Illegal Migration Bill clears Parliament, which is likely to be in September.

One Cabinet source described the preparations for the first flight as ‘extraordinary’.

‘No stone is being left unturned to make sure this goes smoothly,’ the source said.

‘There is really no precedent for a Prime Minister to lead a committee of this sort on the implementation of a Bill has that has not even passed.

‘That legislation will effectively ban Channel crossings. The expectation is it will pass in September and you will see flights beginning within days.

‘People arriving on small boats will be detained on barges for a day or so and then put on a plane to Rwanda or another safe country. Some of them may not even set foot on land.

‘To do that we have to have everything in place – the accommodation, the transport, the legal advice. All of that is underway now to make sure things can happen immediately.

‘As soon as you start getting the first flights to Rwanda you will start to see a deterrent effect. Officials won’t accept it – ministers have had to push this all the way – but the PM is convinced.’

The Court of Appeal is expected to rule this month on legal challenges to the scheme, after the High Court ruled in December that it is lawful.

A Home Office source confirmed the scheme will not begin until all legal appeals in the UK have been exhausted.

The PM has suggested he is willing to use the Parliament Act to overrule the Lords, but this would delay the legislation until next year.