Airlines Cancel Flights, Repatriate Tourists Affected By Greek Wildfires

Airlines including Jet2 and Tuifly have canceled flights to Rhodes, Greece, because of wildfires affecting the island, while EasyJet has arranged repatriation flights for stranded travelers and Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary says it's business as usual.

Wildfires broke out on Rhodes in recent days, leading to some 19,000 people being evacuated, many of them tourists. Other Greek islands including Corfu and Evia have been affected amid a severe heatwave in southern Europe.

LCC easyJet on July 23 said it would operate two repatriation flights from Rhodes to London Gatwick on July 24, in addition to scheduled flights. There would be a further repatriation flight on July 25, the airline said.

“We know the situation for many currently in Rhodes is very difficult,” easyJet said. “The safety and wellbeing of our customers is our highest priority, and we are doing all we can to assist customers in affected areas.” 

Any easyJet flight-only customers who have been evacuated from their hotel and are currently at the airport should contact the airline’s airport staff, the airline added, while customers in affected areas wishing to travel back early can contact the airline.

“If you are booked to travel to or from Rhodes before the 29th of July, our flights are still operating,” easyJet said. “However, if you would like to change your plans, then you will be able to transfer your flight to another date or can request a flight voucher for the value of your unused flights, by calling EasyJet customer services.”

EasyJet Holidays has canceled packages departing up to and including July 25 and customers will receive a full refund, the company said.

Ryanair, meanwhile, said July 24 that flights to and from Rhodes and Corfu were operating as normal and were unaffected by the forest fires. For passengers departing Rhodes, temporary travel documents issued by the Greek police will be accepted in the event of lost passports, the airline said.

During a July 24 quarterly investor call Ryanair Group CEO Michael O’Leary said that his airline had seen no demand for passengers over the weekend seeking to cancel flights to Rhodes. 

“Forest fires are a known phenomenon. They do appear to be getting worse, but in the case of Rhodes, they’re to the south of the island,” O’Leary said. “Most of the resorts and the airport are in the north of the island. We’ve seen no demand for passengers over the weekend seeking to cancel flights to Rhodes. In fact, all of the passengers who are on Rhodes have return flights scheduled today, tomorrow, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.”

He added: “When you’re flying to 260 airports across Europe, are we seeing any changes in demand patterns? No. In fact, if anything over the last two or three weeks we’ve seen stronger demand ex-Ireland and ex-UK with people trying to get the hell away from the unseasonably high rainfalls we’ve had in Ireland and UK, which if anything, gives me even more confidence for sustained growth in Mediterranean holidays over the next ... decade as we grow to 300 million passengers a year.”

Jet2 said July 23 that it had canceled all flights from the UK to Rhodes through July 30. “Due to the wildfires affecting Rhodes and the impact across the island, we have made the difficult decision to cancel all flights going from the UK to Rhodes up to and including 30 July. As a result of this, we will be contacting affected customers with regards to their refund and rebooking options. We currently plan to operate flights from Rhodes to the UK as normal.”

Tuifly described a “challenging” situation in the southeast part of Rhodes in a July 23 statement, saying it was aware that many of its guests were at evacuation centers or in temporary shelter at other hotels. “We are relentlessly working on improving the situation for customers and our teams are working closely with the local authorities,” Tuifly said. “Return flights to the UK will continue to operate as planned.”