Thousands stuck for hours due to glitch in JB checkpoint e-gates
JOHOR BAHRU – All autogates at the Bangunan Sultan Iskandar (BSI) customs, immigration and quarantine (CIQ) complex are now operational and huge crowds at the bus halls have started to disperse.
At press time, about 46 autogates at the bus arrival and exit halls and KTM station have been reactivated in stages on late Dec 8.
“The situation is slowly returning to normal, and we expect everything to be back to normal soon,” a security official said, adding that the autogates have been down since noon on Dec 8 due to a massive technical glitch.
The official said the cause of the widespread failures of all autogates at the bus halls and the KTM station leading to Singapore has yet to be identified.
At the height of the outage, tens of thousands of people were stuck at BSI for up to four hours while immigration officers had to manually clear people for travel.
Immigration had also activated contra lanes to divert travellers at the entry and exit bus halls.
However, all immigration clearance for cars, motorcycles and heavy vehicles were spared from the glitch.
Other government agencies were also functioning without any issues at the complex.
“This has never happened before at the JB CIQ, and it comes at the worst time, especially on a Sunday with a huge number of people, including Singaporeans, coming in for the long school holidays.
“Some of them have been stuck for hours due to the long lines at the bus arrival and exit halls,” the official said, adding that additional security was brought in to ensure order at the complex.
Singapore’s Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) also issued a travel advisory asking people to delay their journey to Johor Baru to help ease the situation.
Earlier, many members of the public took to social media to express their frustration about the long delays. – THE STAR/ ASIA NEWS NETWORK
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