After the power outage around noon on Monday 28 April hobbled airports, airlines and air-traffic control systems in Spain and Portugal, the final flight cancellation count has just been announced by aviation analysts Cirium.
Passengers travelling to, from and within Spain encountered 413 cancellations, while the score for Portugal is 372. But because many of those are links between the two countries, and are therefore “double counted”, The Independent believes the true total is around 500 – affecting an estimated 80,000 passengers.
The worst affected airport was Lisbon, with 45 per cent of departures grounded. Next was Seville, where one-third of departing flights were cancelled. In absolute terms, though, Madrid and Barcelona were the Spanish cities with the highest number of cancellations – around 50 at each.
Cirium says that 25 flights from the UK to Portugal were cancelled, along with 11 outbound flights to Spain. The same number of inbound services were affected. In total, upwards of 4,000 passengers trying to get to or from Great Britain had their flights grounded. Northern Ireland’s airports suffered no cancellations.
Among flights between the UK and the Iberian peninsula, Lisbon saw by far the most cancellations. On the route to and from London Heathrow, a dozen flights were grounded – most on TAP Portugal, but also on British Airways.
Manchester airport had a trifecta of cancellations to and from Lisbon: on TAP Portugal, easyJet and Ryanair.
Of the predominantly holiday airports, Faro on the Portuguese Algarve saw the highest number of cancellations. Some links to and from Bristol, Gatwick, Luton and Stansted were grounded. Malaga, serving Spain’s Costa del Sol, was also hard hit, with services from Gatwick and Luton cancelled.
Among the island flights, the only services cancelled linked Gran Canaria with Bristol on both easyJet and Ryanair.
The only UK-Alicante flight grounded was to and from Newcastle.
With a majority of flights operating, albeit with delays, some returning holidaymakers were unable to reach their airport in order to fly home.
While easyJet has offered passengers in this position the chance to transfer without charge to a flight on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, other airlines may not allow this.
The Independent estimates about 500,000 tourists are currently in Spain – including the Balearic and Canary islands.
An estimated 70,000 UK holidaymakers are in Portugal, including Madeira and the Azores.
Podcast: Simon Calder on the travel implications of the Iberian power outage
Source: independent.co.uk
