A holidaymaker has described how a trip to Greece was transformed into a 33-hour ordeal involving four aircraft, one of which caught fire.
Geoff Lye, 67, vowed to never travel with British Airways again after enduring a chaotic journey while trying to reach Athens.
One flight was cancelled because of a faulty warning light in the cockpit, a second failed to take off after cabin crew exceeded their working hours and a third had to turn back when flames appeared in the engine.
He reached his destination in the early hours of Thursday last week after boarding a fourth aircraft.
Lye, who was travelling with his partner, said: “It makes me embarrassed to be British. There was no communication and it was unbelievable they could get so much wrong.”
He set off on Tuesday last week to visit ancient sites in Greece.
He said that passengers boarded a second aircraft before being told that the flight had been cancelled because had it reached Athens the cabin crew would have exceeded their working hours.
Passengers had to wait an hour to disembark. They were given vouchers to stay in a hotel before returning to the airport the next day.
They boarded the third aircraft at 1.40pm the following day.
Lye told the London Evening Standard: “We just took off and there was a bang and it was the engine next to me. There
was this huge noise and a judder, and then there were about six more bangs. I’m an atheist but even I was praying. Passengers . . . could see flames kicking out from the engine.”
The fourth flight left Heathrow at 7.40pm and arrived in Greece at 12.30am local time on the Thursday.
A BA spokesman said: “We fully appreciate how frustrating this experience has been, and have apologised to our eour customers.”