MAS helps stranded British tourists
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia Airlines Bhd (MAB) is flying twice daily to send home British holidaymakers who are stranded in Spain.
The airline is one of 40 aircraft involved in what is being dubbed the biggest peacetime repatriation plan by the British government to bring home 150,000 United Kingdom-based customers from vacation spots around the world.
Codenamed “Operation Matterhorn”, the repatriation plan was launched by UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) after Thomas Cook, one of the oldest tour companies in the world, ceased its operations on Sept 23.
It will run over a period of two weeks until Oct 6, with more than 1,000 flights planned.
MAB recently confirmed that the airline was taking on the mission and that it had deployed its Airbus 380, which has a 438passenger capacity, to Manchester Airport (MAN) to support the CAA’s repatriation programme.
The national carrier, however, did not provide details on the number of passengers being repatriated and the duration that it chose to be involved in the operation.
Checks, however, showed Malaysia Airlines via Flight MH8493 had completed three flights from Palma de Mallorca Airport (PMI) in Mallorca, Spain, to MAN at press time.
The next flight from PMI is expected to arrive in MAN at 12pm local time.
Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents (Matta) deputy president Mohd Akil Yusof told Bernama the collapse of the UK’s travel giant would not have much impact on Malaysian travellers.
He said of 3,600 travel agents registered with the association, only a small number relied and used Thomas Cook’s services. The rest, said Akil, had migrated to platforms offering better deals.
It was reported that the 178year-old company was laden with debts to the tune of £1.7 billion (RM8.85 billion).
“Due to the significant scale of the situation, some disruption is inevitable, but CAA will endeavour to get people home as close as possible to their planned dates,” CAA had said in a statement.