Working to help

Delia Aston, owner of Clubworld Travel has been working tirelessly to get many of her stranded clients back home and rearrange holidays for outbound passengers.

Delia said: “The government has over-reacted to the current crisis. Safety should be always the number one priority but not all UK and European airspace has been affected.

“Several successful test flights have already been conducted throughout Europe proving there was certain routes available for travel.

“The disruption could be eased considerably by the authority taking decisions based on properly risk assessed facts not unproven theories.”

She added: “We have a number of clients left stranded and we are helping with alternative forms of transport to get them home. Outbound passengers have changed travel dates or accepted refunds.”

According to the Association of British Travel Agents on Monday, about 150,000 people are still stranded and the airspace closure is costing airlines an estimated 130m a day.

Terry Murphy, chairperson of the Terra Travel group, commented: “I’ve never experienced anything like this. The whole thing is having a negative effect on both the long and short term market. You have this in the back of your mind and nobody wants to book anything until they see how things pan out.”

He said: “We’ve people asking what we think about booking for July. There’s no answer to that. We thought this would be over in a few days but it’s dragging on nearly a week.”

Terry stated: “I would go along with the opinion the government has over-reacted. There have been successful test flights, but I suppose all it takes is one flight to get into difficulty. They are erring on the side of safety.”

Terry said: “Even when the airspace is reopened because the flights are scheduled you might not be able to get home straight away. We’ll be doing our best for all our customers.”

Meanwhile Terry discovered he was in the unique position of getting the last flight into Northern Ireland on Wednesday.

“My wife and I came back on the Aer Lingus flight from Tenerife at a quarter to 12 on Wednesday night,” he said. “The next morning all flights were off. We were very lucky to get home.”