PSP Forces Emergency Halt to Biometric Checks at Airport Departures as EES Launch Overwhelms Border Control

Passengers at Risk of Missing Flights as New EU Border System Overwhelms Police Resources

Portugal's Public Security Police (PSP) was forced to suspend the collection of biometric data at departures from Lisbon, Porto and Faro airports on Friday morning — just hours after the European Union's Entry/Exit System (EES) went fully live across all Schengen border points.

The emergency decision was taken at the start of operations after queues at passport control grew so long that passengers risked missing their flights, PSP spokesperson Sérgio Soares confirmed to Lusa.

"Given the long waiting times at Faro, Porto and Lisbon airports — namely Gago Coutinho Airport, Francisco Sá Carneiro Airport and Humberto Delgado Airport — biometrics for departures has been suspended from the start of operations, therefore at the beginning of the morning," Soares said.

Arrivals Unaffected, Security Maintained

The suspension applied only to departures. Biometric data collection continued at arrivals as normal, in line with the EES requirements for non-EU citizens entering the Schengen area. The PSP emphasised that border control continued "with all due security and rigour, with the exception of collecting biometrics" at departure gates.

Soares stressed that the PSP had all border posts fully staffed and operating at maximum capacity across the country's three main international airports. The delays, he said, were caused by the sheer volume of departing passengers — not by understaffing.

"The goal is that the waiting time does not exceed what we intend, that is, so that we do not have people missing their flights," the superintendent said.

Biometrics Resumed by Early Afternoon

By early afternoon, the PSP confirmed that biometric data collection had resumed at all three airports. "Right now, we are collecting biometric data at 100 per cent of national airports, both for departures and arrivals," Soares told Lusa.

The morning's disruption highlights the operational strain that the new EES places on border authorities. The system, which replaces passport stamps with digital registration of photographs and fingerprints for non-EU citizens, has been rolled out in phases across the EU since October 2025 and became mandatory at all Schengen entry and exit points from 10 April 2026.

A European-Wide Challenge

Portugal is not alone in facing difficulties. Spanish airports reported similar queues of up to three hours at some border points on Friday, prompting calls from airport operators for emergency flexibility in how the system is applied during peak travel periods. Italian airports had already flagged capacity concerns ahead of the rollout.

For Portugal — whose main international airport in Lisbon was already ranked the worst in Europe for flight punctuality in 2025, with only 49 per cent of departures leaving on time — the added friction at border control adds another layer of pressure on an aviation infrastructure that has long been criticised as overstretched.

The SEF-successor agency AIMA, which handles immigration, is already dealing with system crashes on its own online platforms ahead of an April 15 deadline for extended residence permits. The EES chaos at airports now adds to the picture of a border and immigration infrastructure under severe strain.

With summer travel season approaching and passenger volumes expected to rise sharply, the question facing Portuguese authorities is whether the current staffing and infrastructure at Lisbon, Porto and Faro can handle the dual demands of the new biometric system and growing air traffic — or whether Friday's suspension was a preview of routine disruptions to come.