Cancelled flights: People from across the Blackpool area remain caught up in Bank Holiday flight chaos

The delays and cancellations were due to a technical issue with air traffic control, and yesterday (Tuesday, August 29), the Gazette asked its readers if anyone had been caught up in the disruption.

In the replies, Irene Anne wrote that she was “[s]till stuck in Rhodes!” whilst Pongo Louise said “[S]till stuck in Dalaman Turkey....” and Lyndsey Buswell commented “My mum was due to fly out to Italy today, her whole holiday has been cancelled”.

Another Blackpool Gazette reader, Alison Kelton wrote: “Yes stuck in Palma, flight home yesterday 28th got cancelled! Airline has rebooked us to return Sunday 3rd September”.

Alison, from Blackpool, went on to say that their airline, easyJet, had told them they could claim any expenses back, although she was not sure how straight forward that would be to do.

She also commented: “I feel sorry for the ones that ventured to the airport left for hours and hours until the flights eventually stated cancelled.”

Speaking to the Gazette the following day, Alison, who works in social care, explained she had planned to go away for a four day break Friday-Monday with her husband Stuart, an energy sector worker.

The couple were first informed of their return flight cancellation on the Monday itself via the easyJet app so they did not have to wait in the airport like many others, and for now are “just making the best of the extra time” in Palma.

Alison said: “[easyJet’s] advice was to find accommodation until the next flight available with them which was going to be Saturday (5 days later). We managed to book that flight, they actually did it for us over the phone there and then no cost just a straight swop. The hotel we was staying in for our break couldn’t accommodate us for longer as they were fully booked so we found our own via booking.com, which was very near by. easyJet told us over the phone that all extra expenses that we had to pay would be reimbursed by them, so hotel food taxis ect. We have kept receipts and will complete a claims form once we return and hopefully not be to much out of pocket.

"Work commitments have been organised from us at this end everybody has been understanding as it’s something that could not of been avoided, we just feel so sorry for a lot of families young people and groups that was here for a few days over the bank holiday and now stranded having to rely on financial support from home, it’s difficult. Hopefully things start to slowly get better and flights return to normal over the weekend, in the meantime we are enjoying some extra unplanned time in the beautiful sunshine.”

The issue began on Monday morning at the headquarters of the National Air Traffic Services (NATS) when its flight planning system failed.

NATS was unable to automatically process the flight plans which are submitted by airlines, meaning they had to be inputted manually which caused huge delays.

Whilst the outage has now been resolved, it is likely to have a knock-on impact for days.