Rome’s airports are warning they may need to suspend the EU’s new digital border system for non-EU travellers ahead of the busiest travel months, arguing it risks triggering widespread disruption.

Marco Troncone, chief executive of Aeroporti di Roma—operator of Rome Fiumicino and Ciampino—told the Financial Times he is “very worried for the summer,” describing his concern as “eight or nine” on a scale of one to ten. He said the EES process has proven incompatible with the peak passenger volumes expected this summer and that the only way to avoid chaos would be to “open the valve” by allowing passengers to skip the biometric part of the enrolment.

Under EES, non-EU citizens (including Britons) must have fingerprints and facial images recorded the first time they enter the EU under the system. After rollout delays, EES became fully operational in mid-April. However, technical problems have contributed to long queues even before the peak season began, with some travellers reporting missed flights.

The reporting also notes that people who have previously gone through EES are sometimes still required to complete checks again, meaning they do not necessarily avoid delays. Meanwhile, European airport officials and the wider travel industry have warned that waiting times could become severe over summer, including calls for governments to use flexibility within the system rather than insisting it should function unchanged.

An airports trade body representative said that decisions on any suspension would ultimately need to be taken by EU governments rather than airports, and that critics believe politicians should stop treating the system as already working smoothly. The European Commission has previously pointed to “built-in flexibility” that would allow some functions to be paused if necessary.