A honeymoon to forget for oldest newlyweds after jet flies in circles
AN ELDERLY couple excitedly jetted off on their honeymoon trip to the Portuguese island of Madeira, only to spend more than 13 hours on their aircraft and land back in the UK the same evening.
A series of mishaps saw Geoff Bliss, 84, and his new bride Sheila, 80, return to Bristol airport with nothing to show from their romantic getaway apart from an empty bag of peanuts each.
Their flight twice failed to land at Madeira’s Funchal Airport due to strong winds and also had to divert to Tenerife to refuel.
When their easyjet flight failed to land in Madeira the second time, it rerouted to land at Faro in Portugal, where the pilot was advised to take all the passengers back to Bristol.
Throughout, everyone was kept on board as there were said to be few or no hotel vacancies in Faro due to the collapse of Monarch.
The couple, believed to be among Britain’s oldest newlyweds, first met as teenagers but have now tied the knot as widowers. They claimed all the airline were able to give them was a packet of peanuts and a drink each.
What should have been a 1,480-mile flight taking three hours and 40 minutes, became a journey of 3,713 miles taking more than 13 hours.
In that time they could have flown to Singapore, Japan, Mexico or even Mauritius.
Easyjet apologised to the Blisses. However, Mrs Bliss, who suffers from arthritis in her knees, vowed never to set foot on another plane again.
Mr Bliss said: “Our friends and neighbours all said, ‘What the hell are you doing back here? You’re supposed to be on holiday’. I felt the way they handled things wasn’t very good. My wife has refused point blank to ever go on a plane again.” The couple flew out from Bristol airport at 7.20am on Monday Oct 2, after tying the knot in their home town two days earlier.
They declined the offer of another flight the next morning. Mr Bliss, from Weston-super-mare, Somerset, said: “I told the rep, ‘Forget it. We’re going home’. Our honeymoon had been totally ruined.”
An easyjet spokesman said: “The safety of its passengers and crew is the airline’s highest priority. While this is outside our control, we would like to apologise for any inconvenience.”