Thousands of Australians remain stranded in Bali or have had their holidays cancelled after a volcanic eruption near the island created a dangerous ash cloud.
On Thursday morning Qantas and Jetstar resumed some flights between Bali and Australia, and Virgin was flying all scheduled flights. All three airlines had earlier cancelled flights to and from the island due to safety concerns from the ash which had spewed 9km into the air.
Some travellers tried to switch flights to Garuda Indonesia, which was still flying.
Amanda Mac, from Melbourne, arrived in Bali on Wednesday evening with her two daughters after their Jetstar flight on Tuesday was cancelled.
“We sat on the tarmac for a couple of hours, then the pilot announced it was cancelled,” Mac said.
She said she had initially re-booked with Jetstar, but then changed to Garuda Indonesia on Wednesday morning on the advice of someone she met at the airport. Jetstar gave her a full refund, she said.
However that flight was also rescheduled for later in the day – it took two bookings, and three trips to the airport, but Mac and family are now on holiday to celebrate the twins’ 18th birthdays.
“I was so relieved,” she said. “Definitely owe my new friend a few drinks for giving me the heads up about Garuda!”
She said everyone on board had been excited to get off the ground.
“Most of us had experienced one or more cancellations. I wasn’t worried about anything, I trust the airlines would have weighed up the risks.”
Other Australian travellers were not so fortunate.
One woman said in a Facebook post that she had lost over $2,000 from flight cancellations and unrecoverable bookings.
Gardua Indonesia was contacted for comment.
The emergency began on Sunday when Mount Lewotobi Laki-laki volcano erupted, spewing an ash column 9km high.
The event in East Nusa Tenggara province, about 500km from Bali, killed nine people and prompted the evacuation of more than 15,000 close to the crater.
On Tuesday, Qantas and Virgin Airlines cancelled up to 10 journeys in total, according to their websites.
On Thursday morning, Qantas said in a press statement that conditions had improved enough to resume Jetstar and Qantas flights between Australia and Denpasar.
“We will continue to monitor the changing conditions and volcanic activity and work on plans to operate more recovery flights,” the statement said.
“We are contacting customers directly to notify them of any changes to their travel plans. We appreciate the changing situation is frustrating and we thank customers for their understanding and patience.”
A Virgin spokesperson said on Thursday it was resuming all scheduled flights in and out of Denpasar.
“We will continue to contact guests whose flights have been cancelled to accommodate them on recovery flights in the coming days,” they said.
– With AAP.
