Brit teacher and baby stranded in Tenerife without answers from TUI for 24 hours
A teacher and her toddler were stranded in Tenerife, left waiting 24 hours for answers from TUI as they had no clue whether their flight would be taking off or not.
Eloísa Delgado Tejera took her 13-month-old daughter back to Tenerife, the island where she grew up, to visit family during the summer holidays. But Eloísa, who now lives in Fairwater, Wales, like so many others was hit by the "technical error" that saw UK air space hit badly.
It led to over 1,500 flights being grounded, affecting hundreds of thousands of passengers, but the teacher was left “fuming” by the poor communication from her airline TUI. After a lovely time on the Spanish island, she was due to fly back to Cardiff Airport at 6.50pm on Monday. But problems arose after they checked in at Tenerife airport.
Speaking to WalesOnline Eloísa said: "When I passed control I found out the flight was delayed until 3.15am. My parents live an hour from the airport so we came back to their house. At 11.30pm I received an email from TUI saying the flight was delayed until Tuesday and they will be relocating people in hotels."
However, because she had already checked in, Eloísa was caught in a bind as all her luggage, things and “baby stuff” was at the airport. She said she spoke to a TUI representative who said they didn't have any information for her and that she would need to return to the airport to get details of the next flight. The airport website also had no information on the flight, and Eloísa described the flight itself as having “disappeared” from the site.
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Eventually she managed to speak to the airport operator which told her to contact TUI. Eloísa felt as if the businesses were "passing the ball". It comes as a UK air traffic control failure has caused widespread flight disruption leaving thousands of passengers stranded.
Addressing the general delays caused by the air traffic control failure, a spokesperson for TUI said: “We understand how important holidays are to our customers, which is why we’re doing everything we can to keep operating as many flights as possible to and from the UK, despite the significant impact to all airlines following the National Air Traffic Control Services issue.
"It is therefore with deep regret that we have been given no choice but to cancel a small number of holidays due the repercussions of the NATS system issues. Those customers impacted will be contacted by us directly to discuss their options, which include getting a full refund for their holiday.
“Our priority remains communicating directly with our customers and making sure they are looked after during this unexpected disruption. Customers travelling on Tuesday 29th August should travel to the airport as usual, unless contacted directly by TUI and told otherwise.”
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