By James Simons-
Over 50,000 BA passengers are stranded on Monday after the airline cancelled over 140 outbound short-haul flights, and 26 long-haul departures, were can on Sunday.
BA has canceled a further 70 short-haul round trips today in addition to nine long-haul flights including departures to Rio, Tokyo and Los Angeles. An extra 15,000 people will be affected by these latest cancellations. This was on top of the fact that hundreds of passengers set for an Argentinian summer holiday on Sunday night had to endure an extra day in snowy Britain as they waited to find out when they would eventually be able to fly.
Departures from Europe’s busiest airport began after heavy snow and torrential rain overnight led to the massive disruptions that have threatened the holiday enjoyment of thousands of brits hoping to escape to sunny holiday destinations. Waiting queues have continued to mount as ice began to build up on their wings while they waited for departure clearance on Monday.
The sweeping cancellations were made by British Airways operations staff on Sunday morning, to create “firebreaks” in the schedule in a desperate attempt to avoid further cancellations. Within an hour, that number had doubled.
Other airlines like Austrian Airlines, KLM, Lufthansa, and Swiss also suffered flight cancellations to and from their hubs, but of a less serious magnitude than that suffered by BA from Heathow.
Passengers on long-haul flights waiting to leave Terminal 5, or at European airports heading for Heathrow faced severe delays From Athens, British Airways planes that failed to make it to Heathrow had to wait for hours to be unloaded. The Eye Of Media.Com heard that several passengers were diverted from Paris, Franfurt, Reykjavik, Helsinki, and Athens to Newcastle.
Passengers from Zurich, Madrid, Gibralter, Zagreb, Vienna, Nice and Madrid were all suffering the hazardous consequences of the heavy snow in Cardiff. Milan. Passengers from Prague and Berlin passenger were forced to pay an unexpected visit to Bournemouth, whilst travelers from Geneva and Krakow bemoaned the disruptive cancellations in Southampton. Passengers from Istanbul were taking on a long journey round the block b before being diverted to Liverpool.