When you are next travelling through an airport take a few moments to look at how clean it is. Are the floors strewn with litter and detritus? No, its sparkling and clean.
Most busy airports employ an army of cleaners whose job it is to keep the airport terminals clean and safe for passengers. They perform their work surrounded by people hurrying off to overseas business meetings and vacations. All the fast food restaurants produce enough packaging to fill the airport bins every day, several times over.
Marie is an airport cleaner at Glasgow’s busy international airport. She has worked at Prestwick as well as Aberdeen and Edinburgh airports but she says that she prefers Glasgow as it is so much busier.
A typical day for Marie and those in her team will start at 4 a.m. when she starts the early morning shift, getting the airport spruced up ready for that days travellers. She told us that the biggest daily problem she must deal with is unattended luggage. ‘Even though people are aware of the threat of terrorism they still leave their bags and wander off to the loo. If I find a bag that is unattended I am required to report it to security straight away. Some poeple can get quite upset when their hand luggage is treated like a bomb.
Marie says that although she doesn’t encounter very many rude or obnoxious passengers it does happen sometimes. She said: ‘There was a young man at the airport last week who purposely dropped his milkshake on the floor that I had just polished and another who just threw his food packaging toward a bin without bother to make sure that it went inside’.
In addition to unattended bags and obnoxious travelers Marie has to deal with the things that people leave behind. She said: ‘These days I find a lot of mobile phones, mp3 players and laptops. I even once found a carrier bag that was stuffed full of American dollars.’
A key skill of anyone working as a cleaner in an airport is the ability to deal with people from all walks of life and from a variety of nationalities. ‘The ability to remain calm when a passenger is panicking because they may miss their flight is definitely a bonus’ said Marie.
Remember: You will get the best deal on Glasgow airport parking, Aberdeen airport parking or Edinburgh airport parking by booking in advance to get up to 60% off the normal cost.
