Passenger on Ryanair flight from Dublin to Faro in Portugal ends up 400km away in Malaga, Spain

A passenger who boarded a flight from Dublin to Faro in Portugal was stunned when the aircraft actually landed at the Spanish airport of Malaga.

Barry Masterson booked a Ryanair flight to fly from Dublin airport in Ireland destined for Faro in Portugal’s Algarve region, on Saturday, September 17. Just imagine his surprise when the aircraft touched down a few hours later only to then discover that he was actually in the Spanish airport of Malaga, 400km (248 miles) from Portugal.

He subsequently took to Twitter to document the ensuing events. It makes for amusing reading but one can only imagine how he and his fellow passengers were feeling though. Just to clear up the reader’s initial thought perhaps, no, Barry had not boarded the wrong flight by accident. 

Got on a @Ryanair flight to Faro and I'm in Malaga lads, you couldn't make this up 😂😭😭

— Barry Masterson (@BarryMasterson) September 17, 2022

Along with the rest of the passengers, Barry revealed how he was placed on a bus that would drive them a good five hours to the correct destination. A total of 157 people had left on the flight from Dublin, as reported by mirror.co.uk.

“We’re on a five-hour bus to Portugal now and we’ve stopped for petrol and pee stops within five minutes. I’m never getting out of here. One bus for 157 people, good luck to everyone we left behind”, Barry’s tweets read.

He explained amusingly: “Got to the Dublin airport 12 hours ago and now I’m in a petrol station in Malaga at 5:41am, send help”.

For somebody enduring such an ordeal, Barry really did have a good sense of humour: “Oh no, this wasn’t a dream, just woke up, I’m still on a bus in who knows where”.

“We’re doing a bus swap at the border. The new bus driver is here sans bus. I’m getting coffee”, he tweeted after travelling across Spain.

Retaining his humour, Barry tweeted: “Had a taxi booked from Faro airport to the hotel last night and their receptionist sent a furious text about us landing in Malaga. I’m sorry we didn’t call to warn you from literally thousands of feet in the air that we were being taken hostage to the wrong country”.

A Ryanair spokesperson threw some light on the situation. In a statement to Dublin Live, they blamed French Air Traffic Control for what had happened, claiming that their strike action had caused the pilot to divert to Malaga.

“This flight from Dublin to Faro (September 16) diverted to Malaga having missed Faro Airport’s curfew due to disruption from the French Air Traffic Control (ATC) strike, which was entirely beyond our control and impacted all airlines flying to/from/over France that day”, she wrote.

Her statement added: “To minimise disruption to passengers, Ryanair quickly arranged for a coach to transport passengers from Malaga Airport to their final destination. Ryanair sincerely apologises to passengers for the inconvenience caused as a result of this unjustified French ATC strike”.

Barry ended his epic tale on Twitter with one final post: 

We had to spend €55 on a taxi for the final leg of the journey, but I have now had a shower and I need food.

Thanks for keeping me company, feel free to hurl abuse in Michael O' Leary's direction 💩

— Barry Masterson (@BarryMasterson) September 17, 2022

___________________________________________________________

Thank you for taking the time to read this article. Do remember to come back and check The Euro Weekly News website for all your up-to-date local and international news stories and remember, you can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram.