Mano Susan was supposed to be at the Doha airport in Qatar on Tuesday morning, from where she was scheduled to take the connection flight to reach Heathrow airport in London with her husband by the afternoon.
Instead, Ms. Susan, 52, from Kakkanad, continues to languish in the security check-in area of the Kochi airport, thoroughly exhausted. She had reached the airport with four other friends on Monday midnight. Their Qatar Airways flight from Doha was originally scheduled to reach the Kochi airport on Tuesday at 2.50 a.m. and return to Doha at 4.15 a.m. However, it was yet to reach the Kochi airport after Qatar temporarily closed its airspace on Monday night following the escalating tensions in West Asia.
Though the airspace had since been opened, the flight schedules remain disrupted. “We were then told that the flight will take off for Doha around 8 a.m, but was eventually cancelled. We opted for a refund,” said Ms. Susan, a housewife.
A group of five friends had set out on a fortnight-long tour of the UK, Ireland, and Scotland, and the disruption could not have come at a worse time. They eventually rebooked on another flight to London via Mumbai on Wednesday morning and checked into a nearby hotel.
“Our experience explains how the impact of a war is not just confined to the players involved, but affects millions around the world who have nothing to do with it. We had planned this trip more than a year in advance, arranged our leaves, and made bookings in the UK. Even if the trip gets delayed by even a day, it will throw a spanner in the entire itinerary,” said Manoj Kumar, a private company employee.
As of Tuesday morning, 17 services to and from the Kochi airport stood cancelled. This included services to Doha, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Muscat, Ras al-Khaimah, Bahrain, Dammam, and Kuwait. In an advisory issued, the airport has asked passengers to stay updated through SMS/email alerts by the airlines concerned and to check flight status regularly via the airlines’ official website or the airport displays.
Later, in the evening, Indigo scheduled a service to Dubai. The Air India Express announced the resumption of services to West Asia in the early hours of Wednesday. However, Qatar Airways flight cancelled its services, QR 516 and QR 517, on Tuesday and Wednesday respectively. Air India was yet to confirm the restart of their operations, the airport statement said.
Published – June 25, 2025 08:49 am IST
