Stansted: Passengers Frustrated By Snow

Passengers stranded after snow forced Stansted Airport to close its runway for two hours have spoken of their frustration.

The Essex airport had to close at 6.20am on Wednesday, just as the day's first flights were due to operate.

Long queues formed throughout the morning as travellers hoped to find alternative flights.

Among them were Steven Ingram, 56, and Stephen Allen, 49, both from Watford, who were due to fly to Spain to watch Barcelona's match against Benfica.

Spurs fan Mr Ingram said: "We left home at 3am for a 6.35am flight. We were on board and ready to go and then were told we'd have to get off again. The crazy thing was, we had to come back through passport control even though we hadn't gone anywhere."

Mark Davison, head of communications for Stansted, said 23 outgoing and 20 incoming flights were cancelled. Most of these were Ryanair which operates the majority of flights from the airport.

He said: "We had early snow followed by falling temperatures and then more snow, which settled on ice, compounding the problem. It was certainly worse than had been forecast.

"We had the runway open again within two hours which, under the circumstances, we are satisfied with. A total area of 500,000 square metres needed to be cleared. Obviously nobody likes to be delayed and we have sympathy for those who have been affected, but we are doing everything we can to help them."

A statement on Ryanair's website said on Wednesday: "We regret that, due to snowfall, the runway at London's Stansted and Luton Airports were closed for a time this morning.

"The runways have reopened and Ryanair advises passengers intending to fly today to travel to their airport as normal. Ryanair was forced to cancel the below flights and we sincerely apologise for any inconvenience caused by these runway closures."