Nov. 1—BERLIN — The first passenger jet departed from Berlin's new airport, BER, bound for London on Sunday. 

The Easyjet aircraft was headed for London-Gatwick with 64 passengers on board.

The new airport had welcomed its first passengers on Saturday, after years of delay that had become a source of embarrassment for the German capital. The new terminal opened a total of nine years behind schedule.

A total of 23 take-offs and landings are planned for Sunday.

The airport, also known as Berlin Brandenburg Airport, is intended to overhaul the city's ageing air transport infrastructure, though its budget roughly tripled, to 5.96 billion euros, before its opening.

Questions have also been raised about how well it will do financially, opening amid a pandemic that has drastically suppressed air travel.

The airport is not likely to meet its expectations for passenger numbers due to the pandemic, with the airport to welcome only 15,000 passengers next Sunday — after it has fully relocated — instead of the 80,000 estimated for normal times.

The new airport's three terminals have capacity for up to 41 million passengers per year, making BER the third-largest airport after Frankfurt and Munich. However, due to the pandemic, it's only expected to handle 10 million this year.

"We will all have a hard winter together," airport boss Engelbert Luetke Daldrup said.

One of the first passengers on Sunday was Karin Brinna-Martin, who was flying to London with her husband. "We wanted it this way: We wanted to be there on the first day," she said.

Airlines are gradually relocating from Tegel Airport, which is expected to close on November 8, with the Lufthansa Group the last to go after Easyjet, Turkish Airlines and Qatar Airways are planning to welcome visitors in Terminal 1 on Sunday.

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