Ask the Pilot

A filthy lobby, sullen-faced employees, no place to sit, and a vague sense of danger all add up to the World's Worst Airport.

By Patrick Smith

Read more: Technology & Business, Business, Airports, Senegal, P. Smith, Ask the Pilot, Food and Travel

May 25, 2007 | Well, I found it. I didn't want to find it, but I knew it was out there somewhere, and since I travel a lot, I suppose it was destined to happen. Suddenly there it was, my home for an agonizing seven hours in the middle of the night.

What I found was the World's Worst Airport. I introduce to you the Léopold Sédar Senghor International Airport, in Dakar, Senegal. There are plenty of people with travel résumés more impressive than mine, but I'd have a hard time believing there's a more awful big-city airport anywhere on earth than this one.

In the past I've been pleasantly surprised by the caliber of terminals in the most unexpected places, from the down-home charm of Roanoke, Va., to the classical Sudanese architecture of Timbuktu. Imagine, for a moment, the airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Is this what you pictured? How about Santiago, Chile? Not that you'd expect anything horrible in Chile, but Arturo Merino Benítez International is one of the nicest facilities I've seen anywhere.

Maybe in your mind the name "Dakar" carries a certain mystique, conjuring up thoughts of Saint-Exupéry, who flew the treacherous Aéropostale mail route between Dakar and Toulouse, France, in the late '20s. His first book, "Courier Sud" ("Southern Mail"), was written in Dakar. Decades later, Concorde was a regular visitor, stopping for fuel as part of Air France's service between Paris and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

That was then.

I'd arrived in the late afternoon after the long drive from the Sine-Saloum delta region, four hours south of the capital, where'd I'd spent two days. With my flight (Alitalia) not leaving until after midnight, the plan was to hunker down at the airport and save the cost of a hotel. Besides, I like airports, and can always find something to do: grab some food; stake out a view and watch planes; visit the various airline counters and fatten up my timetable collection. But this time, the minute the taxi pulled away, I knew I'd made the wrong choice.

Getting from sidewalk to terminal is the first chore, and hardly an easy task owing to the throngs of cabdrivers, touts and self-declared "porters" blocking the way. No rush, however, because once you're inside there is nothing to do and nowhere to go. The tiny central lobby is a filthy, two-story chamber soaked in greasy fluorescent light, ringed with a series of kiosks and counters, several of them mysteriously unmarked. Sullen-faced employees sit idly behind the partitions. Some of them are sleeping. To the right is the check-in hall, a slightly nicer space but off-limits until two hours prior to departure. To the left, on the other side of immigration, is the dreary arrivals lounge and baggage claim. Note to landing passengers: If you have to pee, do so on the aircraft prior to disembarking. There are no lavatories in the arrivals area save for a miserable, closetlike latrine in the far corner that doubles as a mosquito-breeding station.

There are people all around, but few of them are passengers. They are touts, hawkers, vagrants, drifters, thieves -- a melee of dubiously intended hangers-around, each of them eyeing you with the stubborn, languid glare of a vulture. Set against a back wall, the sole ATM is flanked by armed guards, whose duties are particularly effortless, since the machine doesn't work.

There is nowhere to sit, no seats. Which really is all right because the worst thing you can do is cease moving. The approximately 5-to-1 scoundrel-to-passenger ratio ensures you'll never remain unmolested for more than a few seconds. The moment you stop, somebody is hovering over your shoulder, mumbling incoherently. Brush him away, and he is instantly replaced by a man asking if you'd like to buy a plastic watch or a counterfeit phone card. Well, "asking" isn't quite the right word. His demeanor suggests you are required to buy a watch or a phone card. Resistance is futile, and in the honored tradition of third-world hustlers, he is a man of many trades. Do you need any souvenir trinkets? Do you need to exchange currency? Do you need a hotel room; it's just up the road and his "cousin" is the "owner"? No? OK, then maybe you're the giving sort and would be generous enough to simply hand over some money, along with a few of your clothes? You know, a gift, a small cadeau -- to invoke that ubiquitous, reckless plea that floats about French-speaking Africa like a desperate wail. Your sneakers ... what are those, New Balance? "Yes, you can give me those please, thank you. I can have your sneakers now. Cadeau? Cadeau?"

Avoid eye contact. Keep walking.

Next page: One becomes a human pinball, wandering from the departure checkpoint, back along the kiosks again, past the nonfunctional ATM