APPLICATION OF THE EUROPEAN REGULATIONS ON THE RIGHTS OF THE PMR IN SPANISH AIRPORTS.
Rafael Fernández Villasante
Airport services Division Manager AENA
www.aena.es

The spirit of the (EC) 1107/2006 European regulation can be summarized with a few quotations from its articles: "To ensure that the air travel opportunities for people with disabilities or limited mobility are comparable to those of other citizens, we must assist them to meet their particular needs, both at airports and on board, making use of the personnel and equipment needed ", ".people with disabilities or reduced mobility due to disability, age or any other factor must have the same opportunities to use air transportation as the rest of the citizens." , "When a person with disability or reduced mobility arrives at an airport for travelling on a flight, the airport managing body will assume responsibility for ensuring the provision of assistance so that the person can take the flight for which there is a reservation made."

The assistance that the airport managing body (AENA, in this case) should provide consists of the following essential obligations:

-Assistance and necessary measures to enable PMR all tasks regarding the cycle of taking a flight between two airports: Communication arrival at the airport and request of assistance at designated points inside and outside the terminals.
-Moving from these points to the corresponding check-in desk.
-Checking of the ticket and check-in.
-Moving from the check-in desk to the plane, through the relevant checks.
-Boarding the plane with the technical means the manoeuvre requires.
-Moving around inside the plane from the door of the same until the allocated seat.
-Location and Recovery of hand luggage on the plane.
-Moving around inside the plane from the seats until the plane´s door.
-Landing of the plane, providing the technical means and equipment required to do so.
-Moving from the plane to the baggage claim hall, through the corresponding controls.
-Moving from baggage claim hall to the designated point.
-Connection with other flights for passengers in transit, with assistance on land and air, as well as in terminals and between them.
-Moving to services.
-Permission for providing assistance to PMR on behalf of their companions at the airport, boarding and landing.
-On land handling of the whole mobility equipment, upon notification 48 hours before and depending on availability of space and legislation on dangerous goods.
-Temporary replacement of damaged or lost equipments.
-Assistance to guide dogs.
-Communication in the most appropriate format of the information needed to access to flights.

The characteristics of service and the conditioning factors that the Regulation proposes affect, in a different way, to a large number of agents connected within the airport operational. These specific implications for each of the affected profiles define the new scene in which the operational of attention at airports to PMRs will be developed.

Rafael Fernández Villasante
Airport services Division Manager AENA

www.aena.es