Investigation by Ryanair after families board the wrong plane
Two families missed their holiday flights to Spain after Ryanair staff let them board a plane bound for Latvia.
Stephen Pritchard, 37, and son Jake Kelly, 14, and Jo Housley and her three young children thought they were on a flight to Almeria after going through departures from East Midlands Airport at 6.30am on Tuesday.
Instead the two families – who did not know each other – discovered they were on a plane taking them 1,850 miles away from where they were meant to be going.
By the time they realised, they had missed their flight to Spain and were told to catch a taxi to Birmingham Airport for a flight to Murcia, 11 hours later.
The mix up arose after two queues of holidaymakers formed closely together at East Midlands Gate Four where the flight to Riga in Latvia was departing from and Gate Five, where the Almeria plane was flying from, reports the Daily Mail.
Mr Pritchard, from Cannock, Staffordshire, said: "I couldn’t believe it. Our boarding passes were checked three times, at the gate and the concourse and on the plane, where we were even led to our seats."
A spokesman for Ryanair said: "While it is the responsibility of each customer to ensure they board the correct aircraft, we have asked our handling agent at East Midlands to investigate this incident and ensure it does not recur.
"We sincerely apologise to the customers in question, who have been transferred onto the next available flight free of charge, provided with refreshment vouchers and advised to keep receipted expenses for reimbursement of additional transport costs."
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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