Queues at Manchester Airport and for ferries at the Port of Dover
(Ioannis Alexopoulos/LNP/Gareth Fuller/PA Wire)
Thousands of people face having their bank holiday plans plunged into chaos, as British Airways was forced to cancel scores of flights following an IT failure.
At least 156 flights, mainly domestic and European, have been cancelled on Thursday and Friday, The Independent calculates, as BA struggles to operate without essential systems.
As many planes were fully booked at the start of the bank holiday weekend, the number of passengers affected is likely to top 25,000, with many more seriously delayed and encountering missed connections, on what was expected to be the busiest weekend since 2019.
Pointing to forecasts of above-average temperatures, motoring group RAC said it expected the bank holiday “to be a hectic period on major roads”, with drivers expected to make more than 19 million leisure trips over the last long weekend before August – the most since prior to the pandemic.
While analysts Inrix predict severe delays on the M25, M5, and M6, rail passengers face a bank holiday free of strike action, with very few major engineering works planned.
DVLA issues urgent health warning to British drivers
As millions of drivers are set to hit the road this bank holiday weekend, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) is reportedly set to update its guidance for drivers with eye conditions “within weeks”.
The agency is said to have made the move after the Association of Optometrists (AOP) “raised serious concerns” over the published list of notifiable health conditions last year. It claimed it was “so extensive that it could apply to almost every driver who receives a sight test”.
In response, the AOP claims that the DVLA has agreed to revise the list, with updated guidance due to be published “in the coming weeks”.
Oliver Pritchard-Jones has the full report:
Andy Gregory26 May 2023 11:14
Wait times of an hour for tourist cars and coaches at ‘busy’ Dover port
The Port of Dover is said to be “busy” as predicted, but processing traffic “well”, with queues of an hour for tourist cars and coaches waiting to cross the Channel.
Here are some pictures from the port:
Traffic queues for ferries at the Port of Dover in Kent
(PA)
Lorries queue for the Port of Dover…
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