11129 8th Dec - Stansted Airport Closed - 0800hrs

Global warming protesters have shut the airport to flights - hopefully it will be open soon, but there will be delays/cancellations for most of today.

Hope that you and nobody you know is not travelling today, but check with airlines/airport websites if you are.

Ryanair have cancelled some flights [according too BBC]

.[url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/essex/7770513.stm]BBC NEWS | England | Essex | Stansted protest delays flights[/url]

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Category
Travel & Holiday Advice

Runway re-opened at 0810hrs - but disruption will last some time.

Don't we know it!!! OH stuck in the middle of it all - however, things are now moving again, flights are boarding but with delayed departures. Still absoloute chaos in the terminal as people turned up unaware of the situation.
Apparently 52 R'air flights were cancelled, not sure how many others, the problem now affecting those passengers is that there is a seriously short availability of seats for the next few days, not helped by the fact that so many destinations lost their daily service over the winter period. If you are due to travel in/out Std today, the advice is to check in as usual but be prepared for a delay.
On the R'air site there are instructions as to what to do if your flight was cancelled and how to rebook or get a refund - this is only available for a couple of days.
For anyone travelling via STD today pack alot of patience and good luck!!!!

[quote=anne2;104990]Don't we know it!!! OH stuck in the middle of it all - however, things are now moving again, flights are boarding but with delayed departures . ..............................................................For anyone travelling via STD today pack a lot of patience and good luck!!!![/quote]

Hope your OH gets through soon.

Is STD the 'proper' acronym for Stansted?. [To an oldy like me, STD means something totally different - although nowadays I believe its transmuted into STI]
Though, thinking about it - I can see a bit of a link!

Shame BAA didn't 'mash 'em up'

[url=http://www.planestupid.com/?q=content/baa-staff-ram-stansted-protestors-snowplough]BAA staff ram Stansted protestors with snowplough | Plane Stupid - bringing the aviation industry back down to earth![/url]

Actually, I think the plough was used to succesfully block off a second attemted invasion.

[quote=anne2;104990].....................
On the R'air site there are instructions as to what to do if your flight was cancelled and how to rebook or get a refund - this is only available for a couple of days.
For anyone travelling via STD today pack alot of patience and good luck!!!![/quote]

The Ryanair website is down by the looks of things, poor people trying to rebook .....

POSTSCRIPT: Just found that if you go to the Italian version of their site it will load at
[url=http://www.ryanair.com/site/IT/]Ryanair.com - Prenoti il vostro volo poco costoso, gli hotel, affitto di automobile con ryanair.com[/url]

Hope this helps.

[quote=alan h;104993]Hope your OH gets through soon.

Is STD the 'proper' acronym for Stansted?. [To an oldy like me, STD means something totally different - although nowadays I believe its transmuted into STI]
Though, thinking about it - I can see a bit of a link![/quote]

Thanks and sorry, no it's STN!
But yes, I can see your reasoning behind the link, a Freudian slip?!!!!!

Apparently they are all doing their best to 'resume normal service' but obviously a bit of chaos and delay yet as not all planes are in the right place!

minimum 2 years inside for the yoghurt knitters!....bet they havn't got a job between them,thankfully i wasn't travelling today but if they held me up I'd probably have been locked up for kicking them up the jacksy!!....Hold on? I've just had an idea for alternative fuel.....No,maybe not,most of them would be to wet to burn!

Protesters complaining about global warming - its bl**dy freezing here!

Maybe the fifty or so protesters should have been introduced to the thousands of delayed passengers - a useful exercise in democracy......

It seems to me that Ryanair's actions are far more to blame for people's misery than the protesters. Did they HAVE to cancel 50 flights, given that order was restored and the runway opened again by 8am?

Oh sorry Steve,and there was me thinking it was all those ghastly protesters that were to blame!....No doubt you would like to have been there to make sure they all got a hearty warm breakfast inside of them before they all went outside in the horrible cold weather!!...perhaps the 50 planes that should have been in the air before 8 am should have just taken off anyway and just jostled for some airspace like a busy rush hour on the M25!...Gllobal Warming my *rse! Its called evolution.Get over it!

Neil298 - what are you like when you're REALLY get going?? Always a pleasure to read well-modulated debate....

peaceful protest is fine by me, but breakng into a secure area, causing major disruption to a major transport system hub, and disrupting 1000's of people's lives [albeit not fatally as far as we know] is not a peaceful protest.

you have the choice - go abroad or not, fly or drive or better still stay at home neil 298 - I personally don't need the Stansted area covered by concrete so you can take your prejudice abroad. And as for 1000s of peoples' lives being affected (Arty )- they are only passing through. Why should 1000s of people's lives be affected permanently because those who fly a few times a year want a quicker transit. Not my usual type of post and no I don't live near stansted but some people need to get real

Your opinion, and you are entitled to one,as is everyone,My opinion is that this is the 21st century,life and times are a changing,the world is a far smaller place thanks to travel(particularly air travel) god bless Ryanair and other 'budget' airlines that give us the option of seeing so much more than previous generations were able to.To put the blame of so called'global warming' at the feet of airlines is far wide of the mark.Why not blame car travel and protest by sitting in the middle of motorways?.The world will deal with whatever man can throw at it,Governments worldwide call it global warming,I call it evolution.the planet will deal with what man does or doesn't throw at it,as it has done for millions of years,If one day it cant cope then so be it,because that my friend is life and how it is.Im not being flippant or uncaring but what the hell are we supposed to do? regress in to the dark ages?learn to live without power? live off the land and the land only? live in caves again and stick to our own territory? Well me for one ,I'd rather go forward and future generations will learn to deal with progress no matter how 'ugly' it may get and when and if man has exhuasted this planet and all it can offer and it gives out on us then its lights out for all of us!.......ps like i said,everyones entitled to an opinion

To be clear, the protesters didn't stop 50 flights. 10 were directly affected by the protest. (i.e. delayed) Ryanair then cancelled those, and the remainder to minimise the knock-on delays to their schedule. That was a business decision, in which the inconvenience of the passengers at Stansted was not a consideration.

Anyway, arguing with the ignorant is futile, so I'll stop there.