UK airport delays live: Gatwick and Heathrow cancel or delay dozens of flights as fog causes travel chaos – UK Times

With the fog that has smothered the country over the Christmas period expected to lift soon the Met Office has warned of snow and heavy rain causing potential flooding until the New Year.

The forecaster has issued an upgraded yellow heavy rain and snow warning across parts of Scotland kicking in on Monday and lasting until midnight on New Year’s Eve.

Low-lying fog over Huddersfield, Yorkshire. The murky weather has shrouded much of the country over the past few days and shows little sign of abating yet.

Kiera Quayle, from Colchester, Essex, was due to fly from Isle of Man Airport to London Gatwick on Friday evening with her husband after visiting his family – but their flight was delayed by three hours before eventually being cancelled at around 10pm, with their next available journey on Sunday.

“Our five days has turned to seven, it looks like,” Ms Quayle, 30, said.

“It’s frustrating and stressful but I overheard a few families who are now missing holidays and work who have it worse at this point.

“We’re frustrated about the lack of communication – we all knew the flight would likely be cancelled, but just putting it as delayed in an airport where the only food was crisps from the bar wasn’t fair.

“We are splitting our time between in-laws houses as people go back to work and their routines after Christmas – we’re trying not to impose too much at this point and we’re grateful we have places we can stay that aren’t hotels.”

Passengers for flights delayed more than two hours may be entitled to assistance with providing food and drink or overnight accommodation if necessary, an expert from consumer website Which? said.

Jo Rhodes, Which? travel expert, said: “If your flight is cancelled, you also have the choice of being refunded or rerouted on the next available flight.

“If you choose the latter, then your airline must get you to your destination as soon as possible – including with a rival carrier, if necessary.

“Airlines can sometimes be reluctant to buy you a ticket with their competitors, so don’t be afraid to remind them of this rule if another flight could get you where you need to go quicker than they can.”

A plane lands in the mist at Cardiff Airport. The murky weather has shrouded much of the country over the past few days and shows little sign of abating yet.

In some areas, thick fog patches could reduce visibility down to just 100 metres.

The fog will linger long into the afternoon in the South East, the Met Office has warned in its latest update.

Passengers to and from London Gatwick airport experienced severe disruption overnight.

Forty-eight flights to and from the Sussex airport were grounded on Friday, half of them on easyJet.

Gatwick is the busiest single-runway airport in the world, and as such is susceptible to disruption.

Many passengers endured long delays as the evening wore on, many flights were around three hours late. The most extreme case was Turkish Airlines from Istanbul, which was nine hours late when it touched down at 6.34am on Saturday.

EasyJet passengers from Nantes arrived at Gatwick five hours behind schedule, at 2.30am. Another easyJet flight, 8556 from Antalya, left the Turkish airport two-and-a-half hours late and diverted to Bari. It is not known what caused the diversion.

A Tui arrival from Sharm el Sheikh ended up in Birmingham.

On Saturday, easyJet cancelled the morning trip from Gatwick to Belfast City and back and an evening flight to Geneva, while Vueling did the same with Barcelona and Valencia rotations.

British Airways cancelled five round-trips from Gatwick on Saturday, which were scheduled for Algiers, Faro, Innsbruck, Malaga and Salzburg.

The Met Office has upgraded a yellow snow and rain warning.

The forecaster says on Monday in the North and east of Perthshire, precipitation is likely to fall as snow, especially over high ground, with 10-20cm accumulating above 150-200 meters.

As milder air pushes in, snow will turn back to rain, and any rapid snow melt will contribute to flooding in places.

British Airways began the day with 18 cancellations to and from London Heathrow, but that number has sharply increased.

The Independent has now identified 40 grounded flights, including departures to Vienna, Oslo, Barcelona, Rome and Geneva.

Single domestic links to Edinburgh and Glasgow are also cancelled.

An air traffic controller has shown how flights continued despite visible fog swirling over Heathrow in an amazing timelapse video taken this morning as the sun rose.