Thomas Cook evacuates 300 from Egyptian hotel after couple’s deaths

CAIRO: Britain’s Thomas Cook said it was evacuating all 301 of its customers from a hotel in Egypt’s popular Red Sea resort of Hurghada as a precautionary measure after two of its holidaymakers died in circumstances it said were still unclear. Local officials said on Friday both deaths were from heart failure.

John Cooper, 69, and his wife Susan Cooper, a 63-year old who worked for the holiday company in Britain, were staying at the Steigenberger Aqua Magic Hotel and died within hours of each other on Tuesday.thomas Cook said it had received further reports of illness among guests at the hotel, without elaborating. “Safety is always our first priority, so as a precautionary measure we have taken a decision to remove all our customers from this hotel,” the company said. The hotel said there had not been a rise in cases of illness.

A statement from the Red Sea provincial governor’s office, entitled “normal death of an English old man and his wife”, said both had died of heart failure.

John Cooper suffered a “circulatory collapse” and died at the hotel. Susan Cooper was taken to hospital after fainting and died there, it said. The couple’s daughter Kelly Ormerod, who was on the same holiday along with her three children, said the cause of death had not been established. “Mum and Dad were fit and healthy, they had no known health problems,” she said in a statement to British local radio station 2BR.

“We have no cause of death, a post mortem is underway. “Dad never went to hospital, he died in the hotel room in front of me. I went to hospital in the ambulance with mum where she passed away,” she said.