Medicines fear as couple end up trapped in the Canaries
ASTRANDED Runcorn holidaymaker fears he could run out of vital medication after his return flight was cancelled.
Terry Martin, 60, of Murdishaw, and his wife Maureen, flew out to Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands to celebrate his birthday earlier this month.
But the couple is now stuck in the apartment complex with the Spanish authorities only permitting solo trips to the supermarket or pharmacy.
A dip in the sea was cut short on Sunday when the Civil Guard politely ordered them home.
Kitchen fitter Terry has Type 2 diabetes and only enough tablet medication to last until a few days beyond their original return flight date of March 28.
Their airline Ryanair has now plunged into chaos, cancelling their initial flight, and Terry said that when he and his wife booked a Luton flight for March 31, that was cancelled too shortly after, after Terry had paid for it.
He said the couple has now been offered another flight, but with the tickets costing £218 more than they would have paid.
They are refusing on principle.
Spain imposed a statement of emergency on March 14, which happened to be the same day they flew out.
Although Terry and his wife are in an apartment, he is concerned for other holidaymakers, who he said were due to be turfed out of their hotels on March 24 and ‘sent packing’.
Terry said he has not contacted the British consulate on Gran Canaria but has been in touch with his MP Mike Amesbury, Labour, Weaver Vale.
He is keen to find out if his general practitioner could email a prescription for him to print off so he can obtain his medicines in Fuerteventura.
A refund is now not an option, he said, because it will remove Ryanair’s responsibility from making sure the couple come home.
Their attempts to rearrange their flights have been thwarted by the booking system too, which claimed he was inputting the wrong number, even though he had the email there ‘in black and white’.
The Ryanair customer phone line he was told to call is not working also, he said.
Terry is now nervously eyeing his stock of medicine.
He said: “I’ve brought enough to last the duration, enough to last until March 28 and maybe two or three days after that.
“You can only get a month’s supply at a time.
“What I have was enough.”
They are now mired in uncertainty.
Asked how they are now going to return home, he said: “No idea whatsoever.
“We kept checking our flights and we had a message off Ryanair saying our flights had been cancelled and they gave an option for a refund or another flight.
“There were no flights available - there was one on March 26 and they wanted another £218. “I won’t give in on that.” On the second cancelled flight he said: “We booked a flight to Luton airport.
“We’ve got four flights that we’re owed money for that can’t be paid back because of the system.
“We’re not willing to keep paying hand over fist.”
In response to the Weekly News, Ryanair issued a general statement published on March 19, that said most of its fleet will be grounded across Europe in the next seven to 10 days but it is trying to offer customers ‘flexibility’.
It said: “As announced yesterday (March 18), as a result of the spread of the Covid-19 Virus and associated Government travel restrictions, Ryanair will be grounding most of its aircraft fleet across Europe over the next 7 to 10 days.
“We want to offer our customers as much flexibility as possible in relation to their scheduled travel plans and the following options are available to all affected customers:
Customers can move their flight free of charge to a date in the future.
The flight change fee will be waived in full.
Customers will only have to pay the difference in fare.
This flight date change will only apply to the route customers have already booked.
We advise customers to book an alternative flight before March 25.
“We urge all customers who are seeking to return home to avail of the free flight change and book a flight due to travel before March 25 when our schedule will be cut by at least 80%.
“Ryanair apologises for any inconvenience caused by this unprecedented crisis.
“The safety and wellbeing of our people and customers is our main priority and we will continue to comply with all WHO (World Health Organisation) and EASA (European Aviation Safety Agency) guidelines to combat the Covid-19 virus.”