Tromsø Airport — Attraction in Tromsø

I’ve been to over 60 countries and this is possibly one of the worst airports I’ve had to pass through. Too bad giving zero stars is not possible. Usually one does not expect a very pleasant experience at airports, but even then this airport was so bad that I am taking the special effort to write this.

When we arrived, the baggage took more than 30 minutes to arrive on the carousel - because only 8-10 pieces would show up at a time and then the carousel shutter would close again. - we were the only flight that arrived then, mind you. No explanation, nothing. I would have understood if this happened in a major airport like London Heathrow, but not in an airport where there is only one arrival baggage belt!

When it was time to go to the airport 2 hours beforehand to fly out for our 0710 am flight on 31/12, the airport was open and the counters were manned however they were not operating yet as “security is not working yet”. There was absolutely poor to zero indication of the relevant airline’s counters (there was no Edelweiss or Swiss logo to be seen anywhere). How on earth was anyone supposed to know that widerøe does the ground handling for Edelweiss? As a result many people were in the queue for a completely different flight and had to re-queue when the counters suddenly opened at the workers leisure. The queue when I arrived at 0510 was already absolutely haphazard and snaking out to the main doors as nobody knew where they were supposed to queue. A very unfriendly Avinor staff member when approached by other passengers finally said that widerøe did the check in for edelweiss. In total, check in took me 45 minutes and I was the third person in the queue. To top it off, some of the passengers who were using the bag drop after self-check in were approaching the normal check in counters and delaying the queue because some of the bag drop machines were not working - it’s not their fault when there was no one single person assisting them at bag drop, which is the norm in all other airports with such a facility!

Then it was time to take the shuttle bus to temporary terminal C (1 minute away). The small hallway (before security) was already packed with passengers who had already checked in from earlier in the main terminal - because security again was not yet open!

I will also mention here that terminal C (for flights out of Norway) is makeshift and more of a Ryanair type airport and therefore not insulated properly. There were 2 unisex toilets to be shared between all passengers (when i departed, there were two A320s worth of passengers in this terminal). There is a Tax Return counter there but… it is done by the coffee shop, again, with no sign to indicate that the coffee shop also doubles up as a Global Blue tax refund counter!

My impression was that the staff are unmotivated. Most of them look very young, is this a university holiday job for them or something?!

A very poor start and end to the trip which is what passengers will think of when they remember their trip to Tromso. According to the screens, there are only less than 12 flights departing from TOS between the first flight at 0700 and 1500, and out of those 12 flights only 5 were out of Norway.

The Tromso airport management should come to Zürich to see how an airport on Skytrax’s list of Top 10 Airports in the World is run. Especially if tourists are going to be paying an extortionate amount to come to this...

I had really bad experience with this airport when I was flying back home from Tromsø. Unfriendly stuff, organisation of the airport on Ghana level. Our flight was on the schedule on 32C or something like this. I absolutely didn’t know, that there is some other terminal almost 1km away, than the main one. We were able to go throw security check on main terminl (have no idea why…). There was around 8 gates and we had enough time, so I didn’t check from which gate we will fly. Around 40 minutes before scheduled departure was our flight signed like boarding. So we decided to find the gate, but it wasn’t there. I have asked airport stuff on infodesk 4 times, this person always sent us downstairs with words “there is the gate”. And we of course didn’t find anything.. Why no one couldn’t told us, that we have to go outside to other terminal, when I have asked for the first time. So we had to go out from transfer zone, run this 1 km by the road to the other terminal with 20 minutes to flight. Than go on security check where lady told us, that we are late and don’t think so, that we can make it. When we came to the terminl. The airplane wasn’t even there yet. By the fly radar was flying in south of Norway. Unfortunately that is not all. All the passengers had to fit to the small space. And i wasn’t allowed even to go by watter to the tax free shop. The stuff closed the doors and we had to wait 50 minutes in small space we another more than 200 passengers. This story is little bit like from some local airport in AFRICA. Thank you for this horrible end of my...

Arriving in Tromso was nice. Customs was easy. Baggage pickup was easy. Finding our driver was easy. Flying out was troublesome. We checked in with three bags. The baggage system would not accept our bags, so we talked to an attendant. He said he would take care of it and took our bags to the back. We then waited in a very long and slow line for security. It took us 47 minutes to get through security. So, keep that in mind when deciding how early to arrive at the airport. Once through, we headed to our gate, but a woman stopped us and said that once we go to the gate, we can't leave. So, we went to the bathroom and the shops first and then to the gate. Also, plan to be cold. Both arriving and departing, we had to go outside. Arriving isn't so bad. Departing is hard because people take way too long to putz around in the aisle even though the attendant keeps telling everyone to just sit down and they will stow your luggage for you. Finally, just to make things worse... The "helpful" man who said he would handle our baggage didn't do anything. Our bags were never scanned in. So, according to the airlines, they don't exist. I have trackers in them. They are still at the Tromso airport. I have emailed and called and emailed and called and emailed and called the airport every day. I have been unable to get anyone to answer a phone or respond to an email. So, the only way to ever get my bags back it to fly to Tromso and confront them in person. They know that won't happen, so they are happy to ignore the ringing phone and...