Twelve London-bound passengers stopped from boarding Ryanair flight in Madrid

RYANAIR staff in Madrid have refused to allow a group of twelve passengers to board their London Stanstead flight after, it would seem, wrongly claiming that their coronavirus documentation lacked the correct information

Twelve passengers due to fly on the Ryanair Madrid-London Stanstead flight, FR 5993, in the early hours of this Saturday morning, September 4, were unable to access the aircraft when the airline’s check-in staff told them that their documentation was not completely in order, pointing out that the coronavirus antigen test documents they presented as one of the current essential documents to travel to the United Kingdom, “did not include the date of birth”, although it did reportedly include the age of the travellers.

On the official website of the British Government, it is explicitly mentioned that said document, in addition to the identity and the result of the relevant test, must include the traveller’s “date of birth, or age”, the latter of which requirement – the person’s age – was allegedly there in black and white in their certifications presented to the airline staff.

Among the group of twelve people who reported the incident, there were parents with a baby, and two health workers in transit, who informed the airline staff that they were fully aware of the legal requirements that official access documents to the United Kingdom must include regarding antigen test and PCR certifications.

Faced with the complaints from the group of passengers, the company’s check-in staff reportedly decided to “close the boarding access doors”, so one of the passengers alerted the passport control police officers, who offered to escort her to speak with the company, but allegedly told her that “they could not do anything” to facilitate their access to the plane.

Flight FR 5993 left Madrid at 6.15am this Saturday and landed at London Stansted airport at 7.15am, but Efe has reported that after several attempts to contact Ryanair, it could not get in touch with the company to ask their opinion on the incident.

In their pre-recorded telephone information service, a voice indicates to users that Ryanair does not inform passengers of the individual entrance requirements of each country, and that it is the responsibility of travellers to know the specific conditions of travel to the different national territories in relation to the Covid-19 pandemic, as reported by diariodesevilla.es.

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