Airport chaos as Britons turned away from flights home
TRAVEllERS were left stranded abroad and airport arrivals faced queues of up to two hours on the first day of Britain’s border crackdown. New rules came into force at 4am yesterday meaning all arrivals must show proof of a negative Covid-19 test taken within 72 hours of travel.
Passengers are required to show it to check-in staff before boarding their UK-bound flight, and to Border Force guards after landing.
But some travellers found themselves being turned away by their airline and stranded while those allowed to board complained of long, non-Covisecure queues after landing.
NHS worker Ellie Walton, 19, from Moreton- in- Marsh in Gloucestershire, was supposed to fly from Madrid to london on Sunday afternoon.
But she missed the connection because her first flight from Cuba to the Spanish capital had been delayed by nearly two hours. She booked another flight from Madrid’s Barajas airport for yesterday morning and stayed in the airport overnight.
But when she tried to board her new flight she was barred. This was because she didn’t have a negative Covid test, having thought she’d be returning on Sunday before the UK’s new pre- departure testing rules kicked-in yesterday at 4am.
After several calls to the British embassy in Spain Miss Walton was finally allowed on an Iberia plane back to Heathrow last night. In another case, Hannah Holland, 23, from Sheffield, was due to land at Heathrow yesterday but was barred by check-in staff in the US.
She was booked to travel on an American Airlines flight from Philadelphia via Chicago’s O’Hare airport, which was due to land in london at 8.20am.
But Chicago check-in staff said her rapid ‘lateral flow’ test and accompanying health certificate was not acceptable.
Miss Holland, a dual BritishAmerican citizen, had been helping her mother care for her grandfather in Philadelphia. She said: ‘I just couldn’t believe it... it was a test I had to pay for at a local, well-respected health clinic in Philadelphia and was specifically for people who had flights that needed more urgent results.’ She added: ‘I was getting really weepy.’
Miss Holland, a volunteer in Africa with the Peace Corps until the pandemic began, managed to get a flight back to Philadelphia and is now considering whether to seek another test to return to the UK or stay there.
An American Airlines spokesman said: ‘The certificate did not specify the name of the test device as required, and therefore travel to the UK could not be permitted as per government guidelines.’
Meanwhile, those who did make it back to the UK complained of long queues as all passengers’ negative test health
‘I was getting really weepy’
‘There’s no way you can get on’
certificates were checked. The certificate now has to be checked along with a locator form stating where they will be self-isolating for ten days.
Gabrielle Rivers, 31, a research fellow at Oxford University, had flown from Washington to london. She said: ‘I was pretty surprised at the length of the queue. I don’t know how they would expect old people to cope. They are crowding people together in tight spaces, if we didn’t have Covid then, we will now.’
Eric Campbell, 23, who arrived in london yesterday from Kampala, Uganda, said: ‘There were only a few people at each desk which is why the border was rammed as they spent a great deal going through each person’s document.’
And nurse Avis Agustin, 36, from Singapore, arrived at Heathrow yesterday and was shocked by the large queues, spending an hour in line before border checks. She said: ‘I was confused at people in the queue not social distancing.’