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Folks queue at a flight connection desk after a rainstorm hit Dubai, inflicting delays on the Dubai Worldwide Airport, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024.
Rula Rouhana | Reuters
The CEO of Emirates Airline issued an apology letter to prospects over the weekend after historic rains in the United Arab Emirates prompted record flooding and mayhem at Dubai’s airport.
A whole lot of flights have been grounded and hundreds of shoppers have been stranded consequently.
“I wish to provide our most honest apologies to each buyer who has had their journey plans disrupted throughout this time,” firm chief Tim Clark wrote within the letter revealed on the airline’s web site Saturday.
“We all know our response has been removed from excellent. We acknowledge and perceive the frustration of our prospects as a result of congestion, lack of expertise, and confusion within the terminals. We acknowledge that the lengthy queues and wait instances have been unacceptable.”
Whereas the airline’s service hub at Dubai airport remained open, “flooded roads impeded the flexibility of our prospects, pilots, cabin crew, and airport staff to achieve the airport, and in addition the motion of important provides like meals and different flight facilities,” Clark wrote.
A girl and her daughters eat as they wait for his or her flight after a rainstorm hit Dubai, inflicting delays at Dubai Worldwide Airport, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024.
Rula Rouhana | Reuters
He stated that the airline diverted dozens of flights on Tuesday because the worst of the storm raged, and that “over the subsequent 3 days we needed to cancel almost 400 flights and delay many extra, as our hub operations remained challenged by staffing and provide shortages.”
Emirates on Wednesday issued a discover urging vacationers to not come to the airport, apart from in emergency conditions. It additionally suspended check-ins for these meant to fly out of Dubai, put an embargo on ticket gross sales and halted connecting flights from different cities to Dubai, leaving some passengers caught around the globe.
Social media lit up with offended posts from prospects who stated they obtained no assist from Emirates employees and have been unable to contact anybody on the firm.
“12hrs ready on a cancelled flight and 6hrs ready at this desk with individuals fainting, combating and making an attempt to maintain sane and completely no communication from Emirates,” one Instagram consumer posted, together with a photograph exhibiting a packed crowd of individuals in entrance of Emirates screens on the Dubai airport. The time stamp on the photograph was 7:05 a.m. Friday.
One other traveler advised CNBC by way of social media: “It took me 48 hours to get from London to Baghdad by way of Dubai. 5 hours on tarmac in airplane [in Dubai], one hour of which there was nobody to open the gates of the plane bridge. I made my very own means out … discovered a resort and went again, waited 12 hours. Acquired on a flight and so they served us almonds!”
Some individuals stated they have been caught on the airport for greater than 20 hours, and others, stranded in international cities and connecting airports, stated they needed to guide their very own return dwelling after receiving no assist from Emirates.
TOPSHOT – Vehicles are stranded on a flooded road in Dubai following heavy rains on April 18, 2024. Dubai’s large highways have been clogged by flooding and its main airport was in chaos because the Center East monetary centre remained gridlocked on April 18, a day after the heaviest rains on report.
Giuseppe Cacace | Afp | Getty Photographs
Clark stated his employees did their finest to cope with the unprecedented scenario, and that it was “all hands-on deck for hundreds extra staff throughout the organisation to get our operations again on observe.”
The CEO wrote that the airline “despatched over 100 worker volunteers to take care of disrupted prospects at Dubai Airport departures and within the transit space, prioritising medical instances, the aged and different susceptible travellers.” He added that greater than 12,000 resort rooms have been supplied for purchasers in Dubai, in addition to 250,000 meal vouchers issued.
As of Saturday, Emirates’ common flight schedules had been restored. Within the letter, Clark stated the airline nonetheless had greater than 30,000 items of bags to return to prospects.
“We’ve put collectively a taskforce to kind, reconcile, and ship some 30,000 items of left-behind baggage to their house owners,” he stated, including that it’s going to “take us some extra days to clear the backlog of rebooked passengers and baggage,” and asking for purchasers’ “persistence and understanding.”
Clark concluded by pledging to enhance the airline’s processes and thanking his employees for his or her work, in addition to providing “our apologies to each buyer affected by this disruption.”
