A routine hop across the Irish Sea turned into a nearly three-hour trek to southern Spain this weekend, after ferocious winds from Storm Boelo made landing at Bristol impossible.
Flight FR2955 left Dublin at 10.19pm on Saturday, a trip that normally takes under 90 minutes on Ryanair's Boeing 737-800s. The plane cruised at 27,000 feet and began its descent into Bristol, but with conditions on the ground described as far from forgiving, the pilot abandoned the approach. Rather than shuttle between nearby airports, the aircraft carried on south — over the English Channel, across France and down to Alicante-Elche, touching off at 1.16am Sunday roughly 1,000 miles from where it was meant to be.
The diversion was one small slice of a messy weekend for UK travel. Storm Boelo, which arrived hot on the heels of the season's first named storm, Austen, slammed the country with gusts of up to 84mph. On Sunday, Heathrow and Gatwick cancelled dozens of departures, including British Airways services to Edinburgh, Paris, Rome and Aberdeen, easyJet flights to Amsterdam and Jersey, and routes by Aer Lingus, Air France, Lufthansa, Vueling, LoganAir, Emirates and Riyadh Air.
The weather's impact stretched well beyond the airports. In Scotland, major roads were closed by fallen trees and several rail lines shut down. Two men died after being struck by falling trees, and hundreds of thousands of homes lost power. The Met Office kept an amber wind warning active for Scotland and much of northern England from 9pm Saturday until 9pm Monday.
If you're flying into or out of the UK and Ireland while named storms are active, this is a good reminder of how quickly things can unravel — and how far afield a diversion can take you. Keep an eye on your airline's app rather than the departure boards, make sure the airline has your contact details so rebooking alerts actually reach you, and know your rights: EU261 and UK261 rules generally cover care and compensation when weather-disrupted flights are cancelled or badly delayed, though compensation itself may not apply when the cause is genuinely outside the airline's control. Travel insurance with disruption cover is worth having for winter trips in this part of the world.
For anyone with flights booked through Scotland or northern England in the coming days, the amber warning means more cancellations and delays are likely until conditions ease. Ryanair has been contacted for comment on the Alicante diversion, and passengers on affected services should check directly with the airline about rebooking options. Spotted via The Independent Travel.
