A British couple who required special assistance for a Ryanair flight from the UK to Spain were flown 2253 km to the wrong destination in the wrong country despite having their boarding cards checked several times prior to departure. Andrew Gore, celebrating his 47th birthday, was due to fly to Barcelona for a dream trip to mark the occasion with his wife, Victoria, and 10 friends. Instead, the trip turned into what Ms Gore described as her “worst nightmare.”
The couple both have additional needs (Andrew is an amputee and Victoria is autistic), therefore they booked special assistance at Bristol Airport and, according to The Independent, arrived early for their 8:15 am flight. Both had used special assistance services before and in Ms Gore’s words “this was nothing new to us. The minibus took us to the Ryanair plane and they checked our boarding pass and let us on the plane.”
Believing they had been given separate seats at the time of booking, Ms Gore said she asked the air hostess if they could sit together “as I’m scared of flying. She checked our boarding cards again and put us in the second row.” Extraordinarily, the steward, like the minibus exit staff, did not spot the error. Even when the Gores asked the whereabouts of the other family members who were meant to be flying on the same plane, the aircraft staff failed to register that there could be a problem. They went as far as to reassure the couple that the rest of the group was on board.
The Gores had a drink and a nap since they had woken up early for the trip of a lifetime. But when they opened their eyes, they immediately knew they were not in Spain. The couple had been flown over 2250km in the wrong direction to Kaunus, a river port city in southern Lithuania. “As we landed, it was very clear we were in Lithuania,” Ms Gore said.
I was distraught, and scared. I didn’t stop crying. It was my worst nightmare.
Victoria Gore
And the nightmare didn’t end there. According to the Gores, the pilot demanded staff rectify the situation, but there were no direct flights from Kaunus to Barcelona. The couple were instead booked on a flight from Latvian capital, Riga. They spent the night in a hotel before an Uber drove them 240 km across an international border to their new departure airport where they boarded a 2250 km flight to Spain. To make matters worse, on their eventual arrival in Barcelona, the couple had to wait two days for their luggage as it had been removed from their originally booked flight when they did not board.
Commenting on the multiple opportunities staff had been given to realise there was something wrong, Ms Gore said, “They looked at our boarding passes so many times. It’s unbelievable.”
Ryanair has passed blame for the incident to ABM, the service handler at Bristol Airport: “These passengers booked special assistance for this flight from Bristol to Barcelona (25 May), but the ABM agents boarded them onto the wrong flight to Kaunas despite gate signage clearly displaying the flight’s destination,” a spokesperson said. ““We sincerely apologise to these passengers for any inconvenience caused as a result of ABM’s error, and have assured that they will be fully compensated by Bristol Airport.”
Meanwhile a Bristol Airport spokesperson said it would be in contact with the Gores to arrange follow up and “has worked with our airline handling agent and special assistance provider to investigate the circumstances and to introduce improvements for the future.”
