Flight grounded over lapsed licence

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A flight to Gran Canaria had to be cancelled leaving the holiday plans of more than 170 tourist ruined after its captain's licence ran out.

Some of those scheduled to be on the easyJet Airbus A320 plane from Gatwick to Las Palmas were told they would have to wait five days for another easyJet flight.

Those thinking of claiming for the disruption on their travel insurance have been told all the passengers will be compensated for the cancellation.

A spokesman for the airline said: "It's the pilots' responsibility to ensure their licence is in order and, unfortunately in this case, a licence had run out and the flight had to be cancelled.

We are very sorry about this. This has never happened to us before. We managed to get some passengers away on an easyJet flight the next day but there was limited availability and we could not accommodate everyone."

Sarah Milton, 42, from Aldershot, Hampshire, who was on a two-week break with her husband, Greg, 36, and three relatives, told the Sun newspaper: "We were disgusted."

The family had paid about £90 a head for the flight and on being told they could not travel with easyJet until this Saturday, decided to pay more than £3,000 to fly with another airline.

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