Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Antony Thrower

Prince Harry's 'Spare' claim about Thomas Markle's first class flight debunked by airline

More claims made in Prince Harry’s tell-all memoir have been dismissed, amid a flurry of inaccuracies.

Many people have pointed out mistakes within Spare’s 407 pages, including that Harry received an X-box for his 13th birthday years before it was released, and that he was at Eton when he learned the Queen Mother died.

The book also includes a line where the Duke says Meghan Markle booked an Air New Zealand flight from Mexico to the UK for her father Thomas.

But the airline has now revealed it has never operated flights between the two countries.

Harry wrote: “We told him, leave Mexico right now: A whole new level of harassment is about to rain down on you, so come to Britain. Now.

Several facts within Spare's pages have been questioned (Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

“Air New Zealand, first class, booked and paid for by Meg.”

Air New Zealand said of the book’s claim: “We’ve never had flights between Mexico and the UK. And we only have Business Premier.”

The airline added it also does not operate first class seats, reports the NZ Herald.

Several people on social media spoke out about the revelation.

Air New Zealand confirmed it has never operated the route said to have been booked by the couple (AFP via Getty Images)

One said: “Sorry, but I don’t think you get to play fast and loose with memories when you’re trashing peoples’ lives in a book.

“Xboxes and Air New Zealand flights aren’t deal breakers in and of themselves, but they point to the overarching unreliability of the primary source.”

This morning ghostwriter J.R Moehringer seemingly defended Spare in a tweet.

He posted a quote by Mary Karr, author of The Art of Memoir, which said: "The line between memory and fact is blurry, between interpretation and fact.

The book sold more than one million copies in its first day (Getty Images)

“There are inadvertent mistakes of those kind out of the wazoo."

Meanwhile, he also shared several passages from Spare, where Harry admits that his words are how he remembers it.

One said: "Whatever the cause, my memory is my memory. It does what it does, gathers and curates as it sees fit, and there's just as much truth in what I remember and how I remember it as there is in so-called objective facts."

The English language edition of Harry's controversial memoir sold more than 1.4 million copies on its first day of publication.

Speaking about the record sales, president and publisher of the Random House Group Gina Centrello said: "Looking at these extraordinary first day sales, readers clearly agree, Spare is a book that demands to be read, and it is a book we are proud to publish."

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.