Incheon International Airport (ICN) in South Korea has installed a fence around a check-in counter in Terminal 1 to prevent passengers from jumping queues.
The move follows in the wake of a viral video from July 2026 showing travelers rushing to get to check-in counters.
The fence was installed around counter E in the departure area of Terminal 1, with stickers added to the transparent panels to make them more visible and prevent passengers from accidentally walking into them, according to Incheon International Airport Corporation.
Airport authorities have also deployed additional safety personnel to monitor the area and begun displaying digital warnings, stating that check-in services could be denied if staff safety was threatened.
An airport official said there have been no further cases of queue jumping since the measures were introduced, adding that the airport will continue to prioritize passenger safety.
Viral video showed passengers rushing for China-bound counter
After the incident on July 2, 2026, a video circulated online showing dozens of passengers rushing toward check-in counters for a China-bound flight in the departure hall of Terminal 1.
The travelers were believed to be ‘daigou’ – cross-border personal shoppers who buy discounted goods in South Korea to resell in China.
The video shows the travelers bypassing a designated queue arranged in a zigzag pattern with retractable belt barriers, instead pushing luggage carts underneath or around the barriers in an apparent attempt to reach the counters ahead of others.
Local South Korean media outlets reported that at least five similar crowd surges had occurred between July 2 and July 10, 2026.
Several airport employees were reported to have been injured while attempting to redirect passengers back into the designated lines, sustaining bruises and abrasions in the process.
Airport officials attributed part of the congestion to a recent change in aircraft used on major routes between Incheon and China, with some flights shifting from the Airbus A320 to the larger Airbus A350, increasing the number of seats by roughly 100 per flight.
Officials suggest that this shift led to more passengers converging at the same time slots, intensifying competition to complete boarding procedures quickly.
Incheon Airport, ranked as the world’s second-best airport behind Singapore’s Changi Airport (SIN) in the 2026 Skytrax World Airport Awards, handled 38.39 million international passengers in the first half of the year, up 6.3% year-on-year.
The airport has also seen a recent surge in traffic, partly attributed to the US-Iran conflict, which has prompted some airlines to reroute passengers away from Middle Eastern hubs such as Dubai through alternative routes in Asia.