Tui cancels flights and holidays as passengers wait at departure gates

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Europe’s biggest travel firm Tui is canceling several high season holiday packages as it struggles to recover from the CrowdStrike mayhem.

The company’s crew registration system was affected by the IT outage on Friday. Tui grounded 64 holiday flights to and from the UK on Friday, with further delays and cancellations on Saturday and Sunday.

The company is taking the highly unusual step of canceling entire package holidays to deal with the scale of its problems – which are particularly acute at Manchester Airport.

A passenger who had been waiting for a Manchester to Lanzarote flight due to depart at 6am on Sunday morning found out shortly before midday that her entire holiday had been cancelled.

She said The Independent has now made a new booking with Jet2 Holidays to go to Tenerife on Monday.

Tui’s Manchester-Cancun flight, due to depart at 12pm on Saturday, was eventually canceled eight hours later.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner was ready to go to the Mexican resort, but Tui decided to deploy it first to take passengers to Palma de Mallorca and bring others home.

Passenger Lindsay Dawes said that at the departure gate for the Cancun flight, they were told “there is no pilot, the crew is overtimed.”

She said: “We were then sent through security to arrivals where the staff basically couldn’t answer anything and told us to arrange our own hotels and transport for the night.”

Under air passenger rights rules, an airline that cancels a flight is required to provide hotels and meals if necessary.

A Tui spokesperson said: “Due to the global IT issue at airports and airlines around the world on Friday, Tui’s overall service this weekend has been severely affected and we would like to apologize to everyone affected.

“While the initial IT issue was beyond our control, the impact on our systems on Friday meant our flight schedule suffered ongoing delays that we were unable to resolve.

“We have therefore taken the difficult decision to cancel a number of outbound flights and delay a number of inbound flights returning to the UK on Friday 19 July and Sunday 21 July.

“We are very sorry for all those customers affected as we understand how disappointing this would have been and recognize that many customers were already at the airport awaiting their departure.”

“Our teams are working extremely hard to get everyone on holiday or home as soon as possible.”

British Airways and easyJet together canceled dozens of flights on Sunday, mainly at London Heathrow and London Gatwick respectively. They blame the effects of poor weather in continental Europe and severe air traffic control (ATC) restrictions.

An easyJet passenger, Adam Collyer, wrote on X/Twitter: “Flying from Naples airport with easyJet at 10.30am to Gatwick. Canceled at 6:00. There are no alternative flights available and no help or guidance has been provided on their behalf. Now booked with Jet2 flying to Manchester.”

An easyJet spokesman said: “Unfortunately, some flights were unable to operate due to the impact of ATC weather and capacity restrictions imposed in Europe yesterday, July 20, which resulted in delays and some cancellations and as a result , to a secondary effect. impact which resulted in positioning the aircraft off base.

“We are doing everything we can to minimize the impact on our customers by offering those on canceled flights options to rebook or receive a refund, as well as hotel accommodation and meals where appropriate.”

The airline had planned to operate about 3,800 flights this weekend.

To make matters worse for Manchester Airport passengers, there is a points error on the rail line to and from Manchester Piccadilly.

TransPennine Express said: “Train services running to and from these stations may be canceled or delayed by up to 45 minutes.”