Family stranded in Egypt as easyJet cancels flight pay £6k to 'stay off streets'
A family-of-six found themselves stranded in Egypt after their easyJet flight home was abruptly cancelled when the UK suffered an air traffic control meltdown.
Lee and Emma claimed they were forced to shell out a staggering £6,000 to avoid being left "on the streets" at their holiday resort. They had embarked on a trip to Hurghada, Egypt with their four children, aged 15, 14, 12 and eight, on August 12. As they waited for a taxi to take them to the airport on Monday, they discovered that their return flight to Manchester Airport had been delayed until the next day.
The situation worsened when the family learned that their flight home had been cancelled entirely, leaving them stranded in a foreign country on what was Emma's 40th birthday. They claim easyJet only informed them of the cancellation five minutes before their original flight time via email, and have criticised the airline's communication since.
People wait near the easyJet check-in desks following the air traffic control system glitch (Getty Images)In an interview with Grimsby Live, the couple said: "We were due to leave our resort at 6.30pm on August 28 to get our flight at 9.30pm, and at 6pm we received a message from a family friend to say there was a massive issue with air traffic control in England. So we checked our flight status and it told us that it was delayed until 9am the following morning."
Lee and Emma, from Grimsby, Lincolnshire, were forced to cancel their taxi to the airport, choosing instead to avoid spending the night at the chaotic airport with their four children. From the comfort of their hotel, the couple kept a vigilant eye on their flight status. They watched in disbelief as the new flight time fluctuated from 9am to 7am, before finally settling at an inconvenient 1am.
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Lee recounted the frantic moments, saying: "I rang the taxi back to say, 'actually I need a taxi again', but five minutes before the taxi collected us I refreshed the flight status and it came up that it had been cancelled." The only communication they received from easyJet was an email sent five minutes prior to the original flight departure time, informing them of the cancellation.
"Thankfully we didn't go to the airport - we heard rumours that there were riots kicking off at the airport because people are stranded there without any information, so we made the choice that we would stay at the hotel because we have four children." Praising their accommodation, Lee added: "The hotel were absolutely fantastic and put us up for an extra night until we found out more information."
This incident was part of a larger chaos where 1,585 flights were cancelled on Monday alone, and another 345 axed on Tuesday, leaving hundreds of thousands of passengers stranded. The mass cancellations were triggered by an hours-long air traffic control system failure.
Throughout the ordeal, Lee and Emma attempted to contact easyJet for guidance, only to be repeatedly placed on hold and eventually disconnected.
"We were ringing and ringing through the night but we kept being put on hold and then it would cut off completely. We tried contacting them through Facebook and Twitter, but had absolutely nothing back. All we had was that one email to say our flight had been cancelled. In the email, it said you can go online and manage your booking so we went online to try and rebook onto another flight."
However, their attempts to find another flight to Manchester Airport proved futile. Despite searching until Sunday, September 10 - nearly a month after their arrival in Egypt - they found no available flights.
Lee said: "We finally managed to get hold of EasyJet on Tuesday afternoon, and we got a very abrupt customer service representative who searched for alternative flights for us, and told us the next one into Manchester with EasyJet would be on September 12.
"We said, 'If we accept that flight, what happens with our accommodation?' and he basically said, 'That's your problem, I can only sort flights and it's up to you to sort accommodation'. At that point we realised, we've got work and the kids have got school, and we don't want to impact that. September 12 just wasn't reasonable."
Finally, Lee and Emma found a ray of hope in the form of an alternative flight home with Pegasus Airlines via Istanbul in Turkey for Friday, September 1.
In a travel nightmare, a family has been left stranded with hardly any flights available and no direct routes to Manchester. Their only option is a gruelling journey via Istanbul, including a three-hour stopover before finally reaching Manchester to collect their car. "That was the only option. But once we booked our flight home, we took control of the situation," they shared.
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The family's ordeal has cost them a staggering £6,000, which includes their £500-a-night accommodation and the flight home. On top of this, they've racked up £300 in phone bills attempting to contact easyJet from Egypt. Additional costs have also been incurred for airport car parking, taxi cancellation fees, and pet care back at home.
Emma, a mum of four, expressed her frustration: "We've been told that EasyJet will only reimburse what they deem as reasonable costs, and when I asked the man on the phone what this means, he said it was accommodation that is three-star or less. Our hotel is a five-star all-inclusive resort that we booked to celebrate my 40th birthday."
She added: "We decided to stay here because we can't just up and leave when loads of other people are stranded and traipse the streets looking for alternative accommodation when there's six of us."
Lee said: "The most disappointing thing of all is EasyJet's communication. I feel really disgruntled because our hotel could've potentially said, 'we've got no rooms, get out of the hotel', and we would've been travelling around Hurghada with four children looking for somewhere to stay in peak holiday season."
EasyJet passengers claim they've been left high and dry by the airline. The disgruntled travellers allege that the company has shown no regard for their welfare, stating: "As far as easyJet are concerned, we could be on the streets. They haven't even emailed us to ask if we're safe or in accommodation."
The passengers expressed their relief at not having gone to the airport and demanded reimbursement from EasyJet for all the money they've spent due to the inconvenience.
An easyJet spokesperson said: "The impact of the ATC systems failure on Monday was significant, affecting tens of thousands of customers. Our teams have been working around the clock since then to help our customers as quickly as possible. As this is one of the busiest weeks of the year this is very challenging, however we are providing hotel accommodation where it is available and operating additional repatriation flights as well as larger aircraft on many routes."
The spokesperson added: "While this was outside of our control, we are sorry for the difficulty this caused [the family] and we are in touch to assist them further."
* This article was crafted with the help of an AI tool, which speeds up The Mirror's editorial research. An editor reviewed this content before it was published. You can report any errors to [email protected]
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