As easyJet overbooked, families’ summer holidays were left in jeopardy – as regular services to and from various UK airports were cancelled.
A British couple are stranded in Montenegro after their easyJet flight back to Gatwick Airport was destroyed.
Nathan Barnes, 31, and his 30-year-old wife Rachel were due to return from the popular tourist destination on Thursday morning but their flight was one of many canceled by the budget airline at short notice. They received the overwhelming news despite checking in at Tivat airport in the southwest of the country.
Nathan told the Mirror exclusively: “It was the most stressful holiday of our lives. We were all left without food and water, no easyJet representation or updated information.”
“We had a booked flight back to Gatwick with easyJet to Tivat Airport in Montenegro at 11am, we turned up early as the airport is extremely busy and can’t cope with everyone there. We arrived at 8am and checked in as usual.” We waited in the departure hall but the flight was delayed many times, at noon we were informed that a bird hit the plane had caused damage that needed to be checked but would be resolved soon.
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“Around 14:00 or 15:00 the pilot himself told us that the plane could not fly and that they were waiting for an engineer or an expert to fly to Milan and that we would have to stay overnight and fly in the morning if the plane Then we had to go through security and pick up luggage and wait in the terminal for the bus upgrade and accommodation for 170 people. We were left for hours with no information or help from airport staff or easyJet.
Nathan says there were elderly people in the group that had to wait several hours at the airport. By then he and Rachel had decided to book an alternative flight to Gatwick from nearby Podrica Airport, finding and paying for a hotel themselves and spending money on taxis. But this flight with another airline was canceled this morning and the £600 that Nathan and Rachel had set aside went to waste.
Nathan continued: “All the money we’d spent – over £600 on a motel, taxi and new flights – was wasted and then we got a message from easyJet that our rescheduled flight was at 6pm today. We got a taxi back to Tivat. ” which was an additional €100 (approx £84) and an hour and thirty minute drive back to the original airport to get the rescheduled 6pm flight.
“Many elderly people were stuck waiting for hours, easyJet eventually got people into hotels but not until around 7pm which meant they were at the airport for 11 hours before being seen.
“There was a group of pensioners in their 60s, 70s and 80s who were being looked after for hours. I heard they ended up being taken to a hotel, but that might have been from their travel agent, not easyJet.”
“An elderly person was due to have eye surgery which is now canceled due to a flight delay. Luckily we also had Friday off but many other people needed to return yesterday. I just hope we get home today.
“We also heard that the original flight that was damaged by the bird strike had already started boarding and one of them noticed the damage, not the flight crew.”
Regarding Nathan and Rachel’s experience, an easyJet spokesperson told us: “We can confirm that flight EZY6544 from Tivat to London Gatwick on 27 June was delayed overnight to 28 June due to a bird strike which meant the original aircraft was not able to operate.
“We operate our fleet in strict compliance with regulations and have procedures in place to ensure that any issues are resolved. We have done everything we can to minimize the impact of delays, providing hotel accommodation and meals for those who have requested them , and we would like to apologize to customers for any inconvenience caused is easyJet’s highest priority.”
Other flights to and from the UK were canceled, although the budget airline said this was due to “traffic control restrictions” across Europe.
It read: “Due to the impact of air traffic control restrictions that were in place across Europe for most of yesterday, as well as all airlines operating in European airspace, some of our flights were unable to operate with some knock-on effects on today’s operations.
“We have done everything we can to minimize the impact on our customers, providing hotel accommodation and meals, as well as refunds or transfer to an alternative flight, and informing customers that they will be reimbursed if they have to own measures. .”