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Thousands of holidaymakers are facing huge travel disruption this morning after dozens of flights were canceled at London’s Gatwick and Heathrow airports.
Two of the UK’s busiest airports are in chaos today after EasyJet axed 32 flights at Gatwick.
British Airways also canceled the same number of flights from Heathrow.
This is due to air traffic control issues and bad weather across Europe which has left 10,000 passengers in limbo.
Flights include to and from Rome, Barcelona, Lanzarote, Budapest, Venice, Belfast International and Edinburgh.
Ryanair did not make any cancellations, but issued a statement on its website apologizing for the delay due to “repeated shortages of air traffic control staff”.
It reads: “Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, has apologized to its passengers on Monday 8 July for the excessive flight delays caused by the European ATC staff shortage today, Monday 8 July, which is affecting all European airlines.
“ATC services, which benefited from the absence of an ATC strike in France this summer, continue to underperform (despite flight volumes being five per cent lower than in 2019) with repeated ‘staff shortages’.
“On Monday 8 July, 21 per cent of Ryanair’s first wave of departures (134 out of 579 aircraft) were delayed due to ATC ‘understaffing’. These repeated flight delays due to ATC mismanagement are unacceptable.
“We apologize to our passengers for these repeated ATC flight delays, which are deeply regrettable but beyond Ryanair’s control.”
It comes after a British Airways plane was struck by lightning on approach to Heathrow on Sunday afternoon.
Passengers on board flight BA919 from Stuttgart to Heathrow – some returning from Euro 2024 matches in Germany – have spoken of their “shock” after the dramatic incident forced crews to divert to Gatwick.
The flight left Germany just after 1pm local time (12pm BST) and was due to land at Heathrow at 1.40pm.
But bad weather forced pilots to divert to Gatwick, where passengers arrived at around 2pm before being flown to Heathrow.
One passenger, Jeco, told The Sun: “The crew were amazing when our flight was struck by lightning on approach to Heathrow. It was shocking. The flight had to divert to Gatwick.’
Another man, whose son and grandson were on board, described it as the “escape from hell” after passengers were held up by overheating brakes in Stuttgart before being diverted by lightning in the UK.
Passenger Robert Rossall, who was returning from a trip to Germany for the Euros, praised the response of the captain and his crew, telling MailOnline: ‘The captain decided to land at a safer airport given the conditions and the lightning strike.
“Once on the tarmac he was informative and even walked the length of the plane to talk to all the passengers. The flight attendants passed around the bottled water and calmed down. [It was] very professionally handled.”
A map showing the flight path shows the plane traveling on a smooth course before suddenly circling and zigzagging away from Heathrow.
A British Airways spokesman said: ‘BA919 was diverted to Gatwick this afternoon due to weather conditions in the region.
“The flight landed just before 2:00 p.m. Customers were being taken from Gatwick to Heathrow.’
Lighting strikes on flights are very common and usually harmless. According to experts, most aircraft are struck by lightning once or twice a year.