Airlines are suffering from staff shortages related to coronavirus sickness, leading to flights being grounded and passengers at Manchester Airport have reported long queues in recent days.
Eurotunnel warned its vehicle-carrying Le Shuttle rail services from Folkestone, Kent to Calais, France were delayed by three hours due to “a train stopped temporarily in the tunnel”.
The travel disruption is affecting many families heading abroad for the Easter school holiday, which is the first since the UK’s coronavirus restrictions for international travelers were dropped.
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Travel chaos as flights are cancelled
EasyJet canceled 62 flights scheduled today (Monday), after axing at least 222 flights across Saturday and Sunday.
Some holidaymakers reported being stuck abroad with no explanation or alternative route home offered by the airline.
A spokesman for the airline said: “As a result of the current high rates of Covid infections across Europe, like all businesses easyJet is experiencing higher than usual levels of employee sickness.”
The airline attempted to limit the impact on passengers by focusing cancellations on routes with multiple daily flights.
The spokesman added that the number of cancellations “represents a small proportion” of the total of 1,645 planned for Monday.
British Airways canceled at least 115 flights to or from Heathrow Airport today, although the PA news agency reported that it understood only a handful were last-minute cancellations caused by coronavirus-related staff shortages.
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