A athlete who was set to compete in an Ironman triathlon in France was left seething after Ryanair lost his £9,000 bike.
Tom Kennedy, 31, flew from Edinburgh to Nantes on Thursday with his parents Sally and Graham. He was set to compete at an event at Les Sables d'Olonne at the weekend, reports the Daily Record.
On landing, they discovered the airline had failed to load his specialist bike, wetsuit and helmet onto the plane. After training for 12 months, he will be unable to complete in the 70.3KM swim, run and cycle race.
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His mum Sally said the family have been left furious after Ryanair told them they didn't have enough staff to look for the bike left behind at Edinburgh airport.
Speaking to the Daily Record, retired headteacher Sally said: "The bike had an Airtag on it so we know it is still in Edinburgh. Ryanair told us they have no way of getting the bike onto another flight today because they don't have any staff at Edinburgh to look for it.
"They are treating it with absolutely no urgency. It's totally unacceptable. This isn't a lost swimsuit in someone's holiday case. This is a very expensive piece of equipment that an athlete is depending on.
"We just want them to at least attempt to deliver it on time. So far they are saying next week is the best they can do but that is not good enough."
Tom, who is a member of Stirling Triathlon Club, is also due to compete in Australia later this year as part of Team GB and hoped to qualify for further competitions after his performance this weekend.
Sally, 60, added: "We're absolutely gutted for Tom. He's trained so hard for this and was really looking forward to competing. His qualifying times in this race really matter so it's a very important race for Tom.
"His equipment has been designed and measured, especially for him, so using a different bike isn't straightforward. We have tried to get our hands on a rented one but we've had no luck so far."
Engineer Tom first got into running and cycling during lockdown and improved his performance to the extent that he began to take part in competitions as restrictions on large-scale gatherings started to ease.
In the past year, Tom has taken part in a series of gruelling races - including several rounds of the Ironman 70.3 triathlon event in Weymouth, Stafford, Cork and even Majorca.
He has been smashing personal bests across the various disciplines and moved himself into international contention by achieving the All World Athlete ‘bronze’ category.
A Ryanair spokesperson said: “Ryanair operates over 3,300 daily flights across more than 230 destinations and leads the industry with fewest lost bags – one bag mishandled per almost 10,000 passengers.
"We have located this passenger’s lost baggage which is now being short shipped to Nantes. Ryanair apologises for any inconvenience caused as a result of this delay.”
