People line at a flight connection desk after a rainstorm hit Dubai, triggering hold-ups at the Dubai International Airport, United Arab Emirates, April 17,2024
Rula Rouhana|Reuters
The CEO of Emirates Airline provided an apology letter to consumers over the weekend after historical rains in the United Arab Emirates triggered record flooding and chaos at Dubai’s airport.
Hundreds of flights were grounded and countless consumers were stranded as an outcome.
“I would like to offer our most sincere apologies to every customer who has had their travel plans disrupted during this time,” business chief Tim Clark composed in the letter released on the airline company’s site Saturday.
“We know our response has been far from perfect. We acknowledge and understand the frustration of our customers due to the congestion, lack of information, and confusion in the terminals. We acknowledge that the long queues and wait times have been unacceptable.”
While the airline company’s service center at Dubai airport stayed open, “flooded roads impeded the ability of our customers, pilots, cabin crew, and airport employees to reach the airport, and also the movement of essential supplies like meals and other flight amenities,” Clark composed.
A lady and her children consume as they wait on their flight after a rainstorm hit Dubai, triggering hold-ups at Dubai International Airport, United Arab Emirates, April 17,2024
Rula Rouhana|Reuters
He stated that the airline company diverted lots of flights on Tuesday as the worst of the storm raved, which “over the next 3 days we had to cancel nearly 400 flights and delay many more, as our hub operations remained challenged by staffing and supply shortages.”
Emirates on Wednesday provided a notification prompting tourists not to come to the airport, other than for in emergency situation scenarios. It likewise suspended check-ins for those implied to fly out of Dubai, put an embargo on ticket sales and stopped linking flights from other cities to Dubai, leaving some travelers remained the world.
Social media illuminated with mad posts from consumers who stated they got no assistance from Emirates personnel and were not able to get in touch with anybody at the business.
“12hrs waiting on a cancelled flight and 6hrs waiting at this desk with people fainting, fighting and trying to keep sane and absolutely no communication from Emirates,” one Instagram user published, together with a picture revealing a jam-packed crowd of individuals in front of Emirates screens at the Dubai airport. The time stamp on the picture was 7: 05 a.m. Friday.
Another tourist informed CNBC by means of social networks: “It took me 48 hours to receive from London to Baghdad by means ofDubai Five hours on tarmac in aircraft [in Dubai], one hour of which there was nobody to open evictions of the airplane bridge. I made my own escape … discovered a hotel and returned, waited 12 hours. Got on a flight and they served us almonds!”
Some individuals stated they were stuck at the airport for more than 20 hours, and others, stranded in foreign cities and linking airports, stated they needed to schedule their own return home after getting no assistance from Emirates.
TOPSHOT – Cars are stranded on a flooded street in Dubai following heavy rains on April 18,2024 Dubai’s huge highways were obstructed by flooding and its significant airport remained in turmoil as the Middle East monetary centre stayed gridlocked on April 18, a day after the heaviest rains on record.
Giuseppe Cacace|Afp|Getty Images
Clark stated his personnel did their finest to handle the extraordinary circumstance, which it was “all hands-on deck for thousands more employees across the organisation to get our operations back on track.”
The CEO composed that the airline company “sent over 100 employee volunteers to look after disrupted customers at Dubai Airport departures and in the transit area, prioritising medical cases, the elderly and other vulnerable travellers.” He included that more than 12,000 hotel spaces were attended to consumers in Dubai, along with 250,000 meal coupons provided.
As of Saturday, Emirates’ routine flight schedules had actually been brought back. In the letter, Clark stated the airline company still had more than 30,000 pieces of baggage to go back to consumers.
“We have put together a taskforce to sort, reconcile, and deliver some 30,000 pieces of left-behind baggage to their owners,” he stated, including that it will “take us some more days to clear the backlog of rebooked passengers and bags,” and requesting consumers’ “patience and understanding.”
Clark concluded by promising to enhance the airline company’s procedures and thanking his personnel for their work, along with offering “our apologies to each and every customer affected by this disruption.”
