A number of passengers at Dublin Airport were left frustrated after waiting around three hours for their bags after arriving on a flight from Canada.

Passengers arriving yesterday on a Canadian airline WestJet flight from Calgary were left chanting "We want our bags" after being left in the baggage hall with few updates during their hours-long wait.

One passenger, Donegal native David McGinley, said although they got through passport control very promtly, they were left in the baggage hall with little communication from airport or airline.

"We arrived into Dublin Airport at around 11.15am and it was very speedy through the passport check, but we got to baggage claim, it was taking quite a long time. We would have got there at around 12pm at the latest and we left the airport at around 3.30pm," he said.

"There were a lot of disgruntled, tired passengers who were complaining, which was quite understandable. It was the longest baggage delay I've ever had."

Mr McGinley added that he did not lodge a complaint, but there "didn't seem to be anyone at any desk to lodge a complaint to".

WestJet confirmed that there were "significant baggage and security screening delays" seen at Dublin Airport yesterday and apologised to their customers for the inconvenience they faced as a result.

The airline added that delays also impacted its outbound service from Dublin, resulted in a three-hour delay in departure of WS Flight 5, as a substantial number of passengers and bags were delayed in boarding the aircraft.

Despite delaying take off, the flight departed without many of the bags scheduled for departure.

"We are aware of significant security screening and baggage delays, impacting both inbound and outbound guests at DUB," a spokesperson for WestJet said.

"We understand Dublin Airport Authority is working with the appropriate stakeholders to resolve these issues urgently and we are optimistic immediate improvement will promptly follow."

Airport operator daa said that it was "sorry to hear reports of this in Dublin Airport," but that it, as the airport management company, "does not handle baggage on behalf of any of our airline customers".

Neither spokesperson said if other flights faced similar wait times.

Daa "sincerely apologised" on Sunday, after passengers experienced "significant" queues for check-in, bag drop and security screening.

The airport estimated that around 1,000 people missed flights as a result of these queues.