We’ve heard some pretty shocking delay-related travel stories here at DMARGE — from the airline deliberately causing delays to the American man who endured an 18-hour delay last year — but few have involved quite such a staggering setback as this one.
You can always count on Ireland for bad weather and this week the nation has been dealing with a massive winter storm, causing issues for airlines across the board. However, one RyanAir flight endured an especially bad day out: as reported by our friends at One Mile At A Time, Ryanair Flight 633 (which quickly became flight 6333 and 6300 as the delays racked up) ended up taking over 21 hours to reach its final destination on what should have been a 2-hour flight.
WATCH: American Man Endures 18-Hour Flight Delay Before Receiving Once-In-A-Lifetime Reward
On Sunday, January 21, Ryanair Flight FR633 was set to do its usual 774-mile route from Copenhagen to Dublin — a journey which in normal circumstances should take 2 hours and 20 minutes — and was scheduled to depart at 10:35am and land at 11:55am Ireland-time, factoring in the one-hour time difference between points A and B.
After a slightly delayed 11am take-off, the vast majority of the scheduled flight went as planned, with issues only arising during the final descent into Dublin. Bad weather forced a ‘go-around’ but, even after waiting it out, conditions remained too dodgy to land and the flight was diverted across the Irish Sea to Manchester.
Touring The Northwest
And so the waiting game continued: crew and passengers alike patiently waited for things to improve so that they could be on their merry way. Unfortunately, it wasn’t until 5:31pm — over five hours after their landing in Manchester — that the decision was made to resume their journey towards Dublin… but not for long.
Here’s what all of yesterday’s diversions from #StormIsha look like. pic.twitter.com/u1ys9vNfag
— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) January 22, 2024
Now rebranded as flight FR6333, the flight encountered yet more issues after doing the 165-mile hop from Manchester to Dublin. Only half an hour after takeoff number two, the plane was forced into another holding pattern for 35 minutes. Personally, this would be the point at which I would begin to lose my rag, and I imagine cabin crew and passengers felt similarly…
But, somehow, things were set to get worse…
“At this point the decision was made to divert to somewhere with much better conditions, given the limited fuel. So the pilots decided to divert to Liverpool (LPL), just 24 miles from Manchester, where they started their journey…. The plane finally landed in Liverpool at 8:39pm, 3hr8min after it departed Manchester.”
Ben Schlappig
After twelve gruelling hours, including almost seven spent in the air, the flight was called off for the day and passengers were put up in less-than-glamorous hotels in and around Liverpool Airport. The next morning, they departed Liverpool just before 9am and, 35 minutes alter, finally made it to Dublin… only 21 hours behind schedule.
We think this has to be the worst delay we’ve ever encountered, at least in terms of the ratio of expected flight time to final journey time… if you’ve experienced one that’s worse, however, we want to know.