A family blasted "complete chaos" after they said they were "trapped like caged animals" at Manchester Airport.
Over the weekend, the cold snap and snowfall meant runways were closed at the airport, causing delays to those hoping for some winter sunshine. Lisa Robinson was expecting to jet off on her Ryanair flight to Gran Canaria at 1.45pm on December 10, but says passengers were told they needed to wait for a defrosting machine.
But five hours later, the 47-year-old said passengers were told they would be flying out on the Sunday instead and their bags would be staying on board, the MEN reports. Lisa, who was travelling with husband John and son Jacob claimed passengers were offered one cup of water and no food while waiting for several hours.
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The nightmare continued when they spent the night travelling through Manchester and Cheshire looking for a hotel room, only securing one 12 hours after their flight was supposed to depart. The mum, from Sheffield, told the MEN: "We had been trapped like caged animals on the plane.
"It turned into complete chaos. We went to a Holiday Inn Express in the centre of Manchester. We were there for two hours. The first three passengers taken to that hotel were able to secure rooms, but we didn't.
"The manager of the hotel was phoning round, trying to liaise with Ryanair and other hotels. We then went to the Hilton at Old Trafford cricket ground.
"We were sent in taxis that only fit four people and by the time we got there again the first two passengers were able to secure rooms. In the taxi to Hilton I ordered a Dominos to arrive when we got there, but when we arrived we were told we were not staying there. We were then sat for another hour in reception before we were eventually sent to the De Vere hotel at Cranage."
The family, who had to pay £55 for a taxi the next morning, said they were told of a further two hour delay before it finally took off at 3pm, after a sudden "final call" to board the plane. Lisa described the experience as an "absolute s***show".
She added: "We were rather stinky passengers in the morning without a change of clothes. On arrival having gone through security, we sat down at the bar to find out it had been delayed by two hours.
"We were supposed to fly at 12pm but I got up at 11.40am to get a drink, paid for it, and the screen suddenly said final call to board the flight. We had to abandon the drinks and go to the gate. We stood there for 30 minutes to then be told it was delayed for at least two hours because Ryanair was frantically searching for staff to man the plane, to take us to Gran Canaria."
A spokesperson for Ryanair said there had been a small number of delays and cancellations following the adverse weather conditions in recent days. They added: "Due to adverse weather conditions in the UK, we have experienced a small number of delays/cancellations to our flights to/from the UK, including this flight from Manchester to Gran Canaria (December 10).
"Affected passengers were provided with overnight accommodation and passengers can claim any receipted and reasonable out of pocket expanses on Ryanair.com.
"As adverse weather continues across the UK and Ireland, our teams are working hard to minimise disruption to customers and Ryanair advises all customers flying to/from Ireland and UK today (Tuesday, December 13) to check the Ryanair website/app for flight status updates before travelling to the airport. We sincerely apologise for these weather-related disruptions which are beyond our control."
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