A pregnant easyJet passenger fainted after being 'trapped' on a stationary plane for five hours amid airport chaos, it was claimed.
The plane destined for Venice got stuck on the tarmac at London Gatwick on Sunday as a ferocious storm blew over head, causing massive disruption to flight schedules.
Passengers broke into frustrated yells during the lengthy ordeal, which the pilot blamed on air traffic control not answering his calls meaning the flight missed two departure slots, one woman claimed.
An apparently pregnant woman required medical help after fainting on the airport floor, passengers said.
Just before the flight was eventually cancelled close to midnight - eight hours after it should've departed - three passengers were left unattended on the plane with the cockpit door open, it was claimed.
"EasyJet's handling of the situation was absolutely shocking," passenger Stephanie Cocks told The Mirror.
"It was just horrendous and it was really surreal. It was pretty traumatic."
Stephanie, her mum and son had headed to Gatwick on Sunday with plenty of time to spare to catch their flight to Venice to see Stephanie's 97-year-old grandma, who is in a care home.
After an initial two hour long delay, they boarded the flight at 6pm, only to end up sitting on the stationary plane for five hours, Stephanie said.
According to the woman an increasingly irate sounding pilot told the passengers they'd missed two slots as he'd been unable to get in contact with control.
"The pilot came on a couple of times and said staff at Gatwick were not answering his calls, so no one could escort the plane off the stand," the Maidstone, Kent mum said.
"The pilot was getting quite angry, he said he'd phoned the control tower fifty times and nobody answered our call.
"The walkway was removed from the plane so we were trapped on. I was feeling quite claustrophobic.
"We could hear the staff talking. One of the cabin crew was getting a bit stressed. Somebody had threatened to call the police."
She added: "After five hours there was shouting, people were saying 'get us off this aircraft'."
A first aider was brought onto the flight when one of the passengers fainted, Stephanie said, before crew members were stood down as they'd breached their amount of legal allowed hours.
At 11.30am the customers were allowed back to the boarding gate where one woman -who Stephanie understands was pregnant - collapsed onto the floor.
A video shared on Twitter showed the woman being helped off the floor.
"One guy from easyJet he had no idea what to do," Stephanie said. "It took 20 minutes to get a medic to her."
Before the flight was officially cancelled just before midnight, Stephanie's mum and two fellow passengers were escorted back to the plane so they could go to the toilet, it was claimed.
"The guy escorting disappeared, they were left on the plane unsupervised with the cockpit door open," Stephanie said.
After trying and failing to get a nearby hotel, the tired trio took a lengthy Uber back to Maidstone before booking onto another flight the following day.
Thankfully that one did leave the runway.
A spokesperson for easyJet said: "We are sorry that customers booked on flight EZY6557 from London Gatwick to Venice on October 23rd were unable to travel.
"This was due to thunderstorms delaying the flight which meant the crew reached their safety regulated operating hours.
“We did all possible to minimise the impact of the disruption, notifying customers directly of their options to rebook or request a refund, providing hotel accommodation where possible and advised customers required to book their own that they will be reimbursed.
"The safety and wellbeing of our customers and crew is easyJet’s highest priority and while this was outside of our control we apologise for any difficulty experienced by customers who were affected by the weather disruption.”
A spokesperson for Gatwick said: "A number of flights were cancelled or delayed late on Sunday, as air traffic control restrictions were in place across the UK due to poor weather conditions."
