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RYANAIR PASSENGERS HAVE complained they were left with little instruction from the airline after their flight was forced to land at a different Canary island than planned due to bad weather.
It eventually lead to some having to pay for their own transport off the island after boarding the wrong ferry.
More than 140 passengers were flying from Dublin to Lanzarote on Saturday morning when thunderstorms forced the pilot to divert to the neighbouring island of Fuerteventura.
After being told by the pilot they would be able to get a ferry to Lanzarote, the group disembarked the plane and waited at the terminal for their bags.
‘Herded’
However, no instruction was given on what to do next until they were ‘herded’ on to buses organised by the airline to bring them to the ferry port. Some grew frustrated with the wait and arranged for their own taxis.
When the first group arrived, they were told that no tickets had been reserved, meaning many bought them at their own expense.
One passenger on the flight, Max Kyck told TheJournal.ie: ”We were told to disembark [the plane] and get our bags and to go to the Ryanair desk for tickets.
We waited about 30 minutes for our bags. Then a young Spanish girl tried to herd all 144 of us outside to wait for buses. She didn’t know what the situation was with ferry tickets, or what time the ferry was leaving.
Kyck said he was lucky enough to get on the first bus to the port, but others got taxis costing more than €40.
“When we got to the port shortly after 1pm there was nobody from Ryanair and nobody at the port knew anything about our tickets,” he continued, “We waited a while and then bought tickets – €47 for two.”
Once they arrived at Lanzarote, the group again had to arrange for their own transport from the port.
The diversion ended up adding hours to the passengers’ trip.
A spokesperson for Ryanair apologised for the diversion, and explained that a ferry had been arranged, but some passengers arrived too early or went to the wrong ferry company.
Customers are asked to submit receipted travel expenses for reimbursement.
“Ryanair sincerely apologises to all customers affected by this weather diversion,” he said.
Another passenger, who declined to be named, criticised the lack of communication from Ryanair during the incident.
“Someone might have turned up later but there was no one around,” he said.
All passengers were emailed a PDF yesterday morning explaining the terms and conditions of flights which are delayed or diverted.
“[The PDF] is not very straight-forward, most of us have found it to be gobbledygook,” the passenger continued. “And also when you’re on holiday you might not want to check your emails due to data roaming charges.
“But look, we’re here now, and it’s sunny.”
The Daily Mail reports that passengers landing on the same island in 2010 were left without guidance on how to get to Lanzarote.
In this incident, ferry crossings were cancelled, meaning some passengers had to arrange for overnight stays in hotels.
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What a great scoop by the Journal! Passengers ‘abandoned’ by Ryanair for 30 minutes get impatient and make a balls of their connections!
Should have flown with Aer Lingus or BA who have magic wands which can ward off bad weather
exactly. this happens probably hundreds of times a day at airports all around the world. but still some outlets consider it newsworthy. Ryanair needed that plane to be at Lanzarote to bring back passengers from Lanzarote. So if there was any safe way for them to be there, they certainly would have as not getting to Lanzarote completely messes up their schedule.
Safety comes first. If some passengers don’t listen to instructions or actually go up to someone and ask them what to do, that’s not Ryanairs fault.
I’ve been in a similar situation before on a few occasions, having to sort out my own accomodation. it usually all works out in the end. not worth getting stressed over
The Journal has a habit of putting negative headlines on any Ryanair news.
True David, nothing about the Aer Lingus ‘pan pan pan’ going into LHR the other day when it lost an engine on approach.
“Several passengers make a f**k up after their flight is diverted”.
Non story.
‘Exclusive’ Non-Story
I was on that flight & I was pretty happy when he got the plane down after circling the airport at Lanzarote for 45 minutes. Pilot informed us they needed 4 & half kilometres to land but they only had 1 even tough I could barely see the tip of the wing out the window. I kinda knew it was going to be a nightmare when they let us of the plane but hey, still happy he didn’t attempt to land
Even Ryanair can’t control the weather. Very misleading headline.
sounds like the flight crew made the correct decision, buses organised to ferry people safely to their destination, surely a tragedy averted. inconvenient perhaps, but a resolution to a problem by ryanair all the same.
See it’s not about the flight crew. It’s the after care. I don’t think Ryanair are any worse than Aer Lingus but I do remember being they had Servisair or someone deal with all of this stuff in Newcastle airport. They were incredibly rude and didn’t tell us anything for hours, after dumping our suitcases in the middle of the floor of the airport.
Must be a light news morning.
It’s early yet.
Never underestimate the power of stupidity when it comes to airline passengers. An emergency landing at another airport will always require a bit of organisation to turn the situation around.
Those who didn’t wait until things were sorted have only themselves to blame. The idea of travelling by taxi to Corralejo and then getting on the wrong ferry, and having the temerity to complain, is beyond idiocy.
The Daily Mail story of 2010 happened in atrocious weather, when even the ferries had to stop running. At that time Ryanair didn’t have a presence on Fuerteventura, so it took a little longer to sort out. Again stupid ruled, people travelled to Corralejo, waited for non-existent ferries, tried to book themselves into hotels, when Ryanair already had local hotels set up to take them, then tried to sue the airline for their own mistakes.
I have never worked for Ryanair, but have been a transfer rep on Fuerteventura, and know how idiotic travellers can be.
Glad so many people are of the same opinion, passengers could have had some patience not stormed off after 30 mins
I’m not a fan of Ryanair but 30 mins seems a short time when you don’t know the logistics involved, there may have been no buses available, no capacity on ferries.
Last summer I was on a train from Belfast that was delayed at Lisburn because of an accident on the line, it took an hour and a half to arrange buses and this was with a major city just over ten miles away. We never did manage to get on another train and were eventually bussed to Dublin, five hours late.
These things happen and it doesn’t seem, in this instance, that Ryanair abandoned the passengers although communication could probably have been better.
The only place these passengers should have been herded was back on to the aircraft once the weather abated, and flown to their destination.
These passengers paid for a flight, not a ferry through stormy weather.
Chris storms can last for days. Alternative travel means is a satisfactory resolution
Yoy cant take off in a Boeing full of passengers and luggage in Dublin Airport and land in Howth. Is the distance between the airports too short? Only asking.
The above was in reply to Chris who wanted the plane to take off and land again in a distance of 9 miles. Anyone with a stem of sense including myself is a bigger eejit for even taking time to comment on this.
Just for info there’s 3 stages to thunderstorm the build up, the mature and the dissipation stage. All together they take a few hours, of course there can be more than one, but you can fly around them.
Current weather there is a ten knots Northerly wind and clouds at 3000 10+km of visibility. So if this flight was last night, worse come to worse they could have stayed over night in a hotel and flow this morning. I think I’d prefer that than a ferry on what were most likely stormy seas.
Sorry for the lesson but I hate when idiots post their “facts” in a public domain when they clearly haven’t a clue what they’re talking about.
Tom you might need to sit for this! But it’s even possible to take off and land at the same airport, even in airplanes as big as 747.
Chris your the idiot posting on a public forum. Why wait till this morning to get to your destination when you could have got there yesterday?
If your so in the know, do you really think that an Airline would have kept a plane there over night to fly passengers a few miles the next day?
A boat transfer is perfectly acceptable
Worst case scenario was that they wouldn’t get going that night, have a comfortable night in a hotel and arrive early the next morning fresh.
Or most likely sit on the ground for a few hours get a break in the weather and go again.
You suggest they get a plethora of buses and a ferry across rough seas and arrive probably at the airport somewhere in the middle of the night? (Covered in puke from the boat)
Weather radars and satellite imagery are fantastic these days, they can see exactly what these storms are doing, you can even get it on you phone if you wanted.
Thunderstorms don’t always come with rough seas. Hotels can be booked up. Travelling with kids I would prefer to get the boat and arrive at my destination than wait in an airport.
I just realise that the guy arrived at the port at 1pm, I read 1am initially. Absolutely no excuse for Ryanair not to wait a few hours and get their passengers to their destination by air.
It would be very interesting to know where and when that aircraft next departed to.
If the boat option was faster that would be my choice
FFS Swim4Charity swam the distance a few weeks ago with over 25 swimmers. The time it would take for boarding a plane, getting the flight path for an arrival at an airport 9 miles away would be longer than going across on a pedal boat. Apart from that this country is enough of a laughing stock right now without another Paddy Joke about the pilot at Fuerteventura sitting on a runway looking for clearance from flight control for an airport 9 miles away. “and where are we off to today Paddy” “Oh we are just going up the road a few miles, the flight time should be around one minute twenty” etc
Tom you haven’t a clue what you’re talking about. It’s called a positioning flight and happens all the time.
So even if the ferry is a short hop in the buses either side short.
Does it help you in any way, that I’m a commercial pilot and actually no what I’m talking about?
With your spelling I have a clear understanding of why planes land in wrong places then.
I’m sure an man of your intellect could figure out the typo.
Great counter argument by the way.
Free publicity again for Ryanair!
Good auld URyanair taking the piss again…
Yipee the weather is sunny, on for Christmas week.
Maybe it was an ad for specsavers
Was it Ted and Dougal? Craggy island maybe? Remember the episode? Lol
Passengers fecked up their ferry by leaving the group and thinking they can go it alone. But blame ryanair… who the feck is the editor on this bloody site and does he work full time.
If this wasn’t Ryanair, it wouldn’t be a story. Truth is though that they did nothing wrong in this case.
Don’t see a big problem here myself. Once Ryanair got the passengers to there correct destination in the end. Can’t blame Ryanair for the weather tho the customers contract with Ryanair is to get them to a certain destination. On safety grounds because of the weather it’s fair enough for Ryanair to transfer and transport the customers by bus or ferry the rest of the way in good time.
Abandoned on a strange island wandering around aimlessly.. Sounds familiar…
4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42………..
You get what you pay for….
More importantly did they play the”Landing trumpets”
Let’s play ‘lucky dip holidays’!
Story is Skip air has asked for customers to submit expenses….They used to tell u to piss off…coping on
Something very similar happened to me flying Aer Lingus to Faro. Landed in Lisbon without any explanation. We were sitting on the ground and then told to disembark and buses would take us to Faro. As we disembarked we were handed a laminated ticket saying “bus” and that was the last instruction I was given. I wandered around Lisbon airport until I found the information desk, showed the ticket and asked where I could get the bus to Faro. She looked at me like I had two heads and told somebody on the phone (in portuguese) that there was a crazy lady who thought she was in Faro. I corrected her and explained slowly what happened and she eventually directed me to a bus depot. I found more people from the plane and we waited an hour to get on a coach. 4 hours later we arrived in Faro. Just wanted to post this before everyone goes bashing Ryanair – my preferred method of transport to Faro these days!
I was late for a Ryanair flight from, York to Dublin. They held the gate open for me, and all was well. Very happy with overall service.
These passengers were lucky they weren’t on the Sligo to Dublin train.
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