Hundreds of flights cancelled as COVID absences hit airlines

Schiphol, The Netherlands - June 12, 2011: British Airways Airbus A320 taking off from Schiphol airport.

By James Harrison

Travellers around Britain are facing difficulties flying this Easter holiday as airlines cancelled more than 120 flights and Eurotunnel warned of three-hour delays.

British Airways and EasyJet sited staff absences from COVID for cancellations, while a broken down train caused delays, according to Eurotunnel.

Easter will mark the first holiday since pandemic travel restrictions were ended in Britain, but its led to rising demand and frustration for holidaymakers.

According to Simon Calder, a travel correspondent at The Independent, the flight cancellations were a combination of factors that came together in “a perfect storm.”

“We have got very high levels of COVID in the nation and that is affecting the transport industry. But there are also more underlying problems which go back to the start of COVID,” Calder told the BBC.

These include a mass exodus of staff in the aviation industry during the pandemic, leading to long queues at check-in and security.

According to the BBC, passengers in Manchester said they were trying to swap flights to avoid airport “chaos” and Birmingham Airport travellers complained of “chaos” as well.

EasyJet said it cancelled 62 flights from the UK on Monday, which is about 3.7 per cent of its scheduled flights that day.

The airline apologised and said it used standby crew to try offset the problem, but had “to make some cancellations in advance.”

“As a result of the current high rates of COVID infections across Europe, like all businesses, EasyJet is experiencing higher than usual levels of employee sickness,” a spokesman said.

He said passengers were contacted and could rebook on different flights, receive a voucher, or get a refund.

60 British Airways flights to and from Heathrow were cancelled, 50 of which were cancelled in advance, while 10 were late notice overnight cancellations due to COVID sickness among staff.

EasyJet cancels 100+ flights
British Airways cancels 90 flights out of Heathrow
Delays of 3hrs on Eurotunnel, as train is stuck in tunnel
Dover & Folkestone gridlocked as P&O services are out of commission due to no staff, plus a DFDS ferry now docked for repair

UK is fucked!

— James Aithie 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🇵🇸 (@JamesAithie) April 4, 2022

British Airways have had to deal with the struggle of replacing the staff who left throughout the pandemic, forcing the airline to rethink its spring schedules.

The carrier made the decision a couple weeks ago, to pro-actively remove some flights until May. Approximately 20 daily services, primarily on short haul routes, were taken out.

“As a precaution we’ve slightly reduced our schedule between now and the end of May as we ramp back up,” British Airways concluded.

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Email the Travel Weekly team at traveldesk@travelweekly.com.au

Birmingham Airport british airways easter easter holidays easyjet Eurotunnel heathrow manchester Manchester Airport Simon Calder The Independent