Travel disruption – live: Calls for automatic airline refunds grow as Wizz Air adds to advance cancellations
Wizz Air has announced ‘a large number’ of cancellations from 10 June onwards
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Your support makes all the difference.The travel disruption experienced by UK holidaymakers in recent weeks looks set to continue, as Wizz Air becomes the latest airline to announce a series of cancelled flights to and from the UK.
The Hungarian low-cost carrier announced that it is cancelling “a large number of flights” from Doncaster Sheffield Airport from 10 June onwards.
The airline says the move is “a result of Doncaster Sheffield Airport indicating that it is unable to guarantee the terms of its commercial agreement with Wizz Air”.
Meanwhile, easyJet has cancelled at least 30 flights on Friday - the airline has said it is proactively cancelling 240 flights in the 10 days to 6 June, giving passengers some advance notice. British Airways also cancelled 120 flights for Friday - the airline says these are pre-planned and that passengers were given advance notice.
The UK’s airport queues are reported to have largely eased, with fewer problems at security and check-in reported by passengers than in recent days.
Airport chaos sees surge in ferry bookings
As airports and airlines struggle to cope with increased demand this half-term, ferry companies have reported a surge in demand from Brits looking for alternative transport options.
Direct Ferries, the world’s largest ferry ticket booking site, has seen a 37 per cent uptick in UK searches for outbound ferry travel in May 2022 compared to the same time period in 2019.
Niall Walsh, COO at Direct Ferries said: “The ongoing disruption at UK airports for travellers, with many flights being delayed or cancelled due to staff shortages, as well as the soaring costs of car hire for holidaymakers due to lack of available vehicles has meant that many travellers are now choosing to travel to popular European destinations by ferry.
“Dover Calais ferry searches are up 60 per cent, Portsmouth Caen ferry searches are up 20 per cent and Portsmouth Santander ferry searches are up 28 per cent compared to 2019. We expect this trend to continue as there appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel for many flight operators this holiday season.”
Tui cancels hundreds of flights from Manchester
Britain’s biggest holiday company, Tui, announced overnight that it has cancelled nearly 400 flights between Manchester airport and a range of holiday destinations between now and the end of June.
The cancellations began immediately – including a holiday departure from Manchester to Fuerteventura in Spain’s Canary Islands.
Sue Leighton, one of the passengers booked to travel, was told late on Monday about the cancellation.
“We’ve just told the five-year-old grandchild and she was so upset,” she told The Independent.
Read the full story:
Tui cancels hundreds of flights – and tens of thousands of holidays – from Manchester
‘Cancellations of this nature are extremely rare,’ says Tui spokesperson
Eurostar queue ‘more than 1km in total’, says customer
A Eurostar customer has posted images of the dramatic Eurostar queue caused by what the rail operator is calling “a technical issue”.
“The queue extends further: from the departure area, through the shopping parts of the station, in front of the Starbucks, out onto the street, around Barrel Vault, and into the coach and parking lot area. More than a 1 km walk in total,” described social media user Prateek.
The international train company has seen long queues stretching outside St Pancras’s London terminal this morning, caused by “a technical fault with one of our sets earlier” but says it hopes the “backlog” will clear soon.
Travel industry should have prepared for increased demand, says government minister
A government minister has said the travel industry should have been prepared for the ramping up of demand for holidays, amid the chaos seen at UK airports this week.
Lord Parkinson, the arts minister, said the Department for Transport had been working with the industry in the run-up to the Platinum Jubilee.
“We have been on a long pathway back to recovery so that people can enjoy this moment and [companies] should be making sure that people are able to get away on holiday and enjoy it fully,” he told Sky News.
Read the full story:
Travel industry should have prepared for increased demand, says government minister
‘We have been, for many months, urging them to make sure they’ve got enough staff,’ says Lord Parkinson
Eurostar says queues are due to a ‘small backlog'
A Eurostar spokesperson has said there is only a “small backlog” of customers waiting at St Pancras, which they hope will clear imminently.
The spokesperson said: “There was a technical fault with one of our sets earlier, which put it out of service. As such, unfortunately, that particular service left London over an hour late.
“There has since been a small backlog of trains since then delayed by around 30 minutes but otherwise we would expect this to clear shortly.”
Customers reported that queues continued, with Dr Diane Nutt tweeting: “At St Pancras waiting to join an enormous #Eurostar queue. I find this part of travelling enormously stressful.
“It really does feel like there should be a better way, but I know it is probably even worse at #airports this week. #letthetraintakethestrain?!?”
‘Chaos’: Eurostar queues stretch outside of terminal at St Pancras
Customers are reporting that Eurostar check-in queues are stretching outside the terminal at London St Pancras this morning.
Shortly after 10.20am, Edwin Smith tweeted: “We’re queuing out of @StPancrasInt on the street for @Eurostar @EurostarUK. Chaos. No explanation offered…”
Eurostar is blaming “a technical issue which has delayed trains departing from London earlier today”.
The Independent has contacted the Eurostar team for more information.
Tui pilot praised for helping to load baggage onto plane in rain
Tui customers have praised the pilot named Simon, who they said left their waiting plane to go and help load baggage so they could take off sooner.
The incident occured on flight TOM2744 from Manchester to Heraklion yesterday.
Passenger Katherine Cox posted a video of a male employee in a tie, wearing a high-visibility vest and loading baggage onto the conveyor belt in the rain, taken from a Tui plane.
Fellow customer Jenny Cook wrote: “@TUIUK can we get Simon the co pilot of the TOM2744 flying from Manchester on 30th May an excellence award ? He is out on the tarmac in the rain helping to load the bags to try and get us on our way after 30 hours delay so far.”
Several passengers reported waiting more than 30 hours for their flight.
Read the full story:
Tui pilot praised for loading bags onto plane in the rain after 30-hour delay
‘Can we get Simon the copilot an excellence award?’ tweeted passenger
‘Some people couldn’t afford a hotel’: Distressed easyJet passengers stranded in Zurich
EasyJet passengers have claimed they have received “absolutely no support” from easyJet staff after being stranded in Zurich last night following a flight cancellation.
Flight U28118 was cancelled just 10 minutes before its scheduled departure time, 9.30pm, as customers waited at the gate.
Passenger Sophie Ward told The Independent: “The easyJet flight from the night before that had also been cancelled, so some passengers we spoke to had had two flights cancelled in two days.
“Some passengers said they couldn’t afford a hotel for the night and a lot of people were very upset.”
Read the full story:
‘Some couldn’t afford a hotel’: distressed easyJet passengers stranded in Zurich
Exclusive: Customer claims she has had ‘absolutely no support’ from easyJet after flight cancellation
easyJet cancels 42 flights on Tuesday
Britain’s biggest budget airline, easyJet, has grounded 42 flights on Tuesday to and from its main base, London Gatwick.
The carrier gave two days’ warning to most of the estimated 6,000 passengers affected, but there have been additional “on-the-day” cancellations, starting with its 6.15am departure to Belfast City airport.
Among the previously announced cancellations are links with key holiday destinations including Venice, Biarritz and Marrakech.
Read the full story:
All the easyJet flights cancelled today from UK airports
After easyJet grounded its Gatwick-Cologne flight, Ryanair is selling seats for £225 for a 70-minute hop.
Which UK airports are seeing queues this morning?
Gatwick Airport is insisting on social media that its queues are “normal for this time of year”, but some customers have still expressed frustration this morning.
Jackie Wilkes wrote shortly after 8.30am: “having got through the hour long queue just to drop off our bags, now facing nearly a 6 hour wait for our flight. What a s**t show.”
Just before 8.5, customer Nivedita wrote: “Flying to Barcelona today 9am w Vueling. Been in the queue since 7am and have barely moved. At this rate I will miss my flight. What do I do?”
Meanwhile customers at Bristol and Dublin Airports are currently reporting smooth and free-flowing queues.
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