Anyone else in Dubai on holiday? AIBU to be panicking with all the flights cancelled?

[tiantian1005]

Not sure when we can go home..anyone has managed to for example drive to nearby countries and fly from there?

Thanks for this recommendation. I remember the Panorama(?) doc about Latifa.

And they are going to have more issues with insurance covering costs I expect. Not currently getting much attention.

DS's colleague is going to be stranded beyond her holiday and that may have implications for her job as she's not going to be able to get back in time. Other people will be in similar positions. Fine in you have a secure job with good employment rights. But that's not everywhere.

The F1 GP is in Australia in a couple of weeks so I thought about that in terms of affecting people getting to it and Australia generally. There will be people stranded in the UK.

What I hadn't considered but realised on processing the above thought is that pretesting was in Bahrain 26 - 28 Feb so I'm betting half the crew and equipment are going to be firmly stranded for a while too.

And then there's the GP in Saudi and Bahrain in April which are now the stuff of security nightmares with the Qatar and Abu Dhabi GPs to follow in the Autumn. The entire start to the season will be in tatters after economic decisions to chase the money in the Middle East.

Huge financial and economic complications here.

Also the FA Cup in US which Iran is meant to be playing in.

Etihad has begun operating a few flights out of Abu Dhabi. Iran war: Etihad Airways resumes some flights from Abu Dhabi - Yahoo News UK

This includes today's flight EY67 to Heathrow which departed at 14:39 (29 minutes after its scheduled time of 14:10).

I hope the flights continue. Desperate to get my family home.

There's 102k people looking for assistance to get home. It's going to take weeks to get everyone out of there.

Etihad website says all flights suspended until tomorrow earliest so this is either cargo or something else.

No airline would dare risk a packed A380 flight out of the region when the airspace is still closed.

Just checked Heathrow arrivals from Abu Dhabi and flight EY67 is expected to arrive today at 1914. It'll be interesting to see if passengers disembark!

Some of these flights are apparently empty and are just being flown back to their own countries.

They must need the airplanes back - lease costs on airplanes are huge and they will need them all to get passengers stranded in other countries now, especially the large aircrafts. Airlines are commercial businesses with shareholders and need to maximise profit, so leaving an airplane stranded is the opposite of that. As long as they can get insurance for the crew etc. I doubt any FTSE CEO will want to be putting themselves up to be done for corporate manslaughter by negligence etc.

Follow the flight radar group as much of these flights dont have passengers on. I think they will stop them again now as more attacks :(

Update from DHs friend in Dubai. She's allowed in the lobby and her hotel room of her 5* and that's it. No gym. No swimming pool. She's bored shitless.

Meanwhile it looks like Iran has started [sic] to target energy sites in Saudi and Qatar. (I believe this started straight away but hasn't had much coverage).

It's already looking messy.

It's made the headlines! maybe you just don't read/watch the news?

I cant believe people said it was calming down and carrying on posting beach photos saying it was fine.

Agree. Flights to Asia or Australia will either need to squeeze through a narrow gap south of Russia or go south over East Africa. Flights will take longer, so use more crew and aircraft.

A friend of DDs was due to fly out today via Dubai to start a job in Australia. She is already late starting as her visa took some time to come through. Air travel is only part of it. The Strait of Hormuz is closed to shipping, so oil supplies will struggle to get through.

A lot of inconvenience for a lot of people. With probably increased oil costs for all.

Can’t she re-route her flights? Probably expensive I know. Eg flight to Delhi and straight home from there?

I mean they started targeting oil rigs on Saturday night... But that didn't get much coverage.

No gym, no swimming pool. How terrible for her....

A girl's school was hit in Iran killing multiple children so forgive me if your friend being bored is really not that important. I can't ever imagine NOT being bored in Dubai. It's hardly brimming with culture...

AIUI the full closure of UAE airspace has been lifted to allow limited operation of repositioning and repatriation flights.¹

A Lufthansa flight which left earlier does seem to have been just a transit flight to reposition equipment back to Munich, and operated under a special flight number LH-9851. It makes sense for Lufthansa to want to get its aircraft out of Abu Dhabi and back to base.

In contrast, the Etihad flight is heading for London under the usual EY-67 flight number, and Etihad wouldn't have an obvious motivation for just moving its kit out of UAE, having previously obtained special permission to move planes back there which had been stranded away from home. Apparently "the limited number of flights given clearance to depart on Monday are reserved for passengers who have been stuck in transit since the weekend".²

¹ Etihad resumes operations after limited airspace reopening - ch-aviation
² Etihad Airways Restarts Flights From Abu Dhabi Despite Saying it Wasn’t

Holiday choices are going to be interesting es long haul

Not my friend.

More of an update for other people for what is happening on the ground in Dubai. It's not somewhere I'd choose as I'm not big on heat.

I've posted my concerns about Iran. Hope that meets your approval.

We can be concerned about all aspects of this.

@IngridBurger @EmeraldShamrock000 do you know where I can find the document about the Princess I want to show my daughter

Given the thread is titled "Anyone else in Dubai on holiday" I think it is perfectly reasonable to learn that tourists are confined to their rooms. It must be terrifying, especially as no one has any idea whether it will get worse or better and when.

Gas prices to soar by 45%. Iran's missiles able to reach deep inside Europe. Fear that hidden terror cells in Europe will become active. Just a few of the DMs new headlines. Flights to Cyprus now cancelled to add to the chaos.

IANBU to wish the very best to all those caught up in this. Including those trapped in a five star hotel room, far from home.

<Checks shonky latch on Smug Dickhead enclosure gate>