Gatwick has also urged passengers to prepare ahead of time by placing all liquids, creams, gels, balms and pastes in one resealable, transparent bag – separate to hand luggage – when going through security.
 
The London airport has also revealed the top five items most frequently left in hand luggage before security screening are toothpaste, Vaseline, cigarette lighters, inhalers and hand sanitiser.
 
In recent weeks, around 10,000 hand luggage items going through the scanner have been rejected and need to be searched every day – which adds an average of five minutes to the time taken to pass through security.
   
Gatwick has recently re-established its short-haul network to destinations across Europe and grown its long-haul network, which now serves 40 routes. 

The school summer holidays will see several million passengers travelling through the airport, with top short-haul destinations including Barcelona, Malaga and Dublin, and top long-haul routes including Dubai, Toronto and Orlando.

Adrian Witherow, chief operating officer at Gatwick, said the airport "expects to be busy" as passenger numbers "rapidly" return to 2019 levels.
 
"We are doing everything possible to make the airport process as smooth as possible, including recruiting and training hundreds of new security staff, many of whom have already started or will be in the coming weeks," he added.

"It’s also important however that we do what we can to help passengers prepare for security before reaching the trays."