Ryanair latest: Passengers left furious as flight cancellations spark chaos

Budget airline: Ryanair has apologised after it announced it was cancelling 50 flights daily for six weeks
Ryanair
Fiona Simpson19 September 2017

Stranded Ryanair customers have branded the airline a “disgrace” as boss Michael O’Leary apologised over the cancellation of thousands of flights.

The budget airline faces paying out £17.7 million (20 million euro) in compensation over shelving 50 flights for the next six weeks.

More than 200 of the cancelled flights are either into or out of London Stansted, with a handful in Edinburgh, Manchester and Birmingham also affected.

Mr O’Leary branded the situation a “mess” and blamed the cancellations on the over-allocation of pilots’ holidays over a busy period.

The company look set to lose £4.4 million in profits, the airline's chief executive said as he made a grovelling apology at a press conference.

Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary has apologised to customers
PA

He said: “Clearly there's a large reputational impact, for which again I apologise.

“We will try to do better in future.”

However, when asked if his job was at stake over the chaos, he replied: “No, I don't think my head should roll, I need to stay here and fix this."

Many customers who have been offered alternative flights said they were forced to pay out hundreds of pounds for extra accommodation and taxis after being flown to the wrong airports.

Carrie Ann Woodgate and her partner, Alan Fosberry, from Newcastle, discovered their flight home had been cancelled mid-way through a break in Wroclaw, Poland

Speaking to the BBC, Ms Woodgate said that her holiday had been a "total disaster".

The couple were offered a refund of their £19.99 tickets, or a rescheduled flight for the following Thursday - four days after their original flight.

"I feel pure frustration and anger at Ryanair for leaving us stuck in the middle of Poland. We rely on these companies to get us home,” Ms Woodgate told the BBC.

Harry Bilaver, from London, was due to travel to Tallinn, Estonia, for his son's first birthday party.

However, at 21.00 the night before flying, he received a text message telling him it had been cancelled.

Mr Bilaver told the BBC: "The cancellation wasn't the end of the world, but it was a real inconvenience for me and my partner."

"My partner was stuck in Tallinn with my young son and unable to prepare for his birthday party.

"We have lost three days of our holiday."

Another couple hit out at the airline after discovering their flight from Edinburgh had been axed.

They are now heading out to the Scottish capital and have no idea how they are going to get back home after the four day trip to visit family.

The pair, from Portsmouth, told the Daily Mail: “They are going to refund the flight, but everything is up in the air. We could be hundreds of pounds out of pocket.

“Because of the late notice getting a flight home it's going to be very expensive.”

Mr O'Leary said customers whose flights have been cancelled will have received an email by Monday evening.

This will inform them what flights they can transfer to which will be "hopefully on the same or, at worse, the next day".

Under EU law, passengers given less than 14 days’ notice of a flight cancellation are entitled to claim compensation worth up to 250 euro (£221) depending on the timing of alternative flights and if the issue was not beyond the responsibility of the airline, such as extreme weather.

Mr O'Leary said: "If they're not satisfied with the alternative flights offered, they can have a full refund and they will all be entitled to their EU261 compensation entitlements.

"We will not be trying to claim exceptional circumstances.

"This is our mess-up. When we make a mess in Ryanair, we come out with our hands up.

"We try to explain why we've made the mess and we will pay compensation to those passengers who are entitled to compensation, which will be those flights that are cancelled over the next two weeks."

Cancelled flights are listed here and cover the period up to October 28.

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