A daughter is furious at easyJet after her disabled parents were left “sleeping rough” in an airport.
Lynda MacMahon, 37, from Pollok, has slammed the budget airline for the 'disgusting' way it treated her family on Sunday.
Helen McMahon, 59, who suffers arthritis, and Stewart McMahon, 65, who battles severe MS, were “abandoned” in London Gatwick for around 12 hours after their flight was suddenly cancelled.
The family were also travelling with Lynda’s sister and her three children, all under the age of 11, along with Lynda’s brother who struggles with learning difficulties.
They had to take turns sleeping on a hotel lobby sofa before hiring a minibus themselves to take them home the following morning.
Speaking to the Glasgow Times, Lynda said: “I am disgusted at how my family was treated by easyJet, I couldn’t believe it.
“I was desperately trying to get them a new flight home or accommodation but everything was cancelled or fully booked.
“They had to take turns sleeping on a couch in a hotel lobby attached to the airport, it was a nightmare.
“When my parents found out that they may not get a flight until Wednesday they just bit the bullet and hired a minibus home which they took shifts driving.
“Not everyone would have the money to pay for that and some people would be really stuck, it was chaos.
“Storms happen, flights get cancelled, I understand that, but easyJet should not have just abandoned my disabled parents.”
Helen also spoke to the Glasgow Times about her experience, saying: “We were left sleeping rough in a hotel lobby with lots of other customers.
“The stress and anxiety has been a lot for us, I saw people crying including staff.
“We are out of pocket about £1900 after paying for the minivan, food, and missing a day's work because of the experience.
“You would think they might have put buses on or offered some sort of help but they didn’t.
“It really took the polish off our holiday.”
The family had been returning from a cruise and had planned to grab a connecting flight from Venice to London to Glasgow when chaos struck.
They arrived at London and boarded the plane but were told since it was too heavy, they would have to leave their luggage behind to be shipped.
Helen decided to stay behind with the bags and catch another flight, but then at around 9pm the entire flight was told to get off the plane as it had been cancelled over bad weather.
It was then they desperately looked for other ways home or a place to stay, but instead shared a couch in the reception of Sofitel London Gatwick, before renting the minibus.
Now they are anxious to use the travel giant again and are hoping for compensation for the ordeal.
A spokesperson for easyJet said: "We are very sorry for the family's experience following the cancellation of their flight from London Gatwick to Glasgow on October 23, due to thunderstorms delaying the flight which led to the crew reaching their safety regulated operating hours.
“The safety and wellbeing of our customers and crew is our highest priority.
"We did all possible to minimise the impact of the disruption, providing options to rebook or a refund and while we always look to source hotel rooms for our customers where needed, due to the weather impacting all airlines at Gatwick, hotel availability in the area was very limited and we are sorry for any difficulty the family experienced as a result of this.
“We always want to ensure that customers who require special assistance receive the support they need at the airport and so we are looking into their experience with the airport and their special assistance provider who are responsible for providing this to our customers.
"We are in contact with the family to apologise for their experience and reimburse them for any expenses they incurred.”
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