Part of Terminal 1's Ceiling Has Come Down Twice in a Few Weeks, Both Times Over the Passport Control Being Rebuilt

Twice within a few weeks, part of the suspended ceiling in Terminal 1 at Václav Havel Airport has fallen, and both times in the place where the building is being worked on: the arrivals passport control, which has been under reconstruction since September. Letiště Praha confirmed both incidents to Zdopravy.cz on 5 November. No injuries are reported in either.

The first came to light only because of a video. Security-camera footage posted on X shows a ceiling section carrying display screens coming down directly in front of the passport desks — the space where arriving passengers stand in the queue, and through which, Zdopravy.cz notes, thousands of people pass every day. The airport said the clip was not new.

The attached video does not show today's event but an incident from October. These are therefore two separate events in the course of the ongoing reconstruction connected with the expansion of the Terminal 1 passport control.

— Letiště Praha, statement to Zdopravy.cz

The second fall happened at around 04:30 on 5 November. According to the airport's spokesperson, Denisa Hejtmánková, the affected area had already been closed off and cleared as a precaution because of the works, so nobody was in it. The airport says the incident has had no effect on check-in or on passenger movement, and the damage has not yet been put at a figure.

Whose fault, by the airport's account

On the October fall, the airport's preliminary conclusion is that it was caused by a mistake on the part of the building contractor. The contractor then assessed the situation and decided that work would continue. The airport has given no cause for the second fall.

Zdopravy.cz does not name the contractor in its report. The construction contract for the passport control, as the same outlet reported from the public contracts register in September, went to a consortium of BAK stavební společnost and PULSKLIMA for CZK 259.8 million excluding VAT. Whether the ceiling work was theirs or a subcontractor's is not stated.

The person who posted the October video accused the airport's management of keeping both incidents quiet. The airport rejected what it called unfounded claims of deliberate concealment. It is worth noting what is on the record: the October fall became public through a video posted on social media, not an airport announcement, and the airport's confirmation of both came on the day the clip circulated.

The works go on

The project is the one this site covered when it started: five more conventional counters and four EasyGoGate self-service gates in Terminal 1 arrivals, a larger waiting area in front of the border control and a complete renewal of the ventilation. According to the airport, the air-handling reconstruction began this September and is being carried out with the terminal in full operation. The September contract notice put the noisy, dusty and demolition work mostly between 22:00 and 05:00. The second fall, at 04:30, came inside that window; the airport has not said when in October the first one happened.

Completion is still expected at the end of April 2027. Nothing in the airport's statement suggests the schedule or the method has changed after the second incident.

That is the open question. Building inside a terminal that never closes is the premise of the whole job, and the airport's answer to two falls is that the area was cordoned and the hours were quiet. That held on 5 November. The October footage, though, shows the ceiling coming down on the queuing area itself, and the airport has said nothing yet about what, if anything, changes over the passport desks for the five months of work still to come.