Welcome to another masterclass in European Union efficiency. Rome’s airport bosses are currently looking at the EU's brand-new biometric border security system and deciding that the only way to save summer is to literally turn the thing off. In what can only be described as a hilarious self-own for Brussels, Aeroporti di Roma is threatening to bypass the system completely to prevent a total travel meltdown.

The genius system in question is the biometric Entry-Exit System (EES), a digital border database designed to collect facial scans and fingerprints from non-EU travelers, including Brits. It was supposed to make borders high-tech and secure, but instead, it has done what EU regulations do best: created massive, soul-crushing lines and caused passengers to miss their flights before the summer rush even starts.

Marco Troncone, the CEO of the company running Rome's Fiumicino and Ciampino airports, is not holding back. On a scale of one to ten, his panic level is sitting at a solid "eight or nine." Troncone basically admitted that trying to get 100% of non-EU travelers enrolled in this broken system during peak summer volumes is a physical impossibility. His solution? Just "open up the valve" and let people skip the checks.

You really can't make this up. The EES was delayed repeatedly by buggy, dysfunctional tech before finally rolling out in mid-April. And the rewards of this high-tech upgrade? The International Air Transport Association (IATA) reports that waiting times have already hit three and a half hours, with predictions of six-hour queues during the summer peak. Imagine saving up all year for a vacation only to spend a quarter of a day standing in a sweat-soaked airport hallway because some Eurocrat’s database crashed.

To make things even more ridiculous, the system can't even remember people who already registered. Passengers who have already gone through the biometric onboarding are constantly forced to do the whole process over again. It’s an absolute loop of administrative incompetence.

Over at the airport trade body ACI Europe, president Stefan Schulte gave a blunt reality check, telling politicians to "stop pretending... that EES is working just fine. It is not." He pointed out that it’s up to individual sovereign governments to pull the plug on this disaster, rather than leaving local airport managers to take the heat for Brussels' failures.

We are already seeing localized panic button presses across the continent. French police threw their hands up and suspended the extra checks at the Port of Dover back in May because the gridlock was too insane. Meanwhile, Greece completely walked back a promise to spare UK tourists from these biometric digital cages until September.