Liz Weir was left behind by an easyJet flight from Belfast to Edinburgh (Picture: Facebook / Liz Weir)
Three easyJet passengers who needed wheelchair assistance were left stranded on the tarmac after a plane took off without them.
Liz Weir, a well-known author and narrator, was among the passengers left watching in disbelief as the aircraft backed away from them at Belfast International Airport on Friday afternoon.
The 73-year-old said she arrived at the airport at 10.30am for her 1pm flight from Northern Ireland to Edinburgh, where she had been due to host an event the same day.
Mrs Weir, from County Antrim, requires a wheelchair due to a heart condition, meaning she had to wait for all the other passengers to get on first.
But when she was escorted to the steps, they were pulled away and the pilot ‘shook his head’ while making ‘a signal’ to suggest she was not able to board.
Two other passengers were also left behind.
‘It’s totally discriminatory what has happened,’ she told The Irish News. ‘And to make things worse, the plane left with my suitcase still on it.’
Mrs Weir, 73, said she was waiting her turn to board when the steps were taken away and the pilot gestured to say she was not allowed to get on (Picture: Liz Weir)
She and two other wheelchair users watched as the easyJet plane left them stranded on the tarmac (Picture: Liz Weir)
Mrs Weir told the BBC that she didn’t arrive in the Scottish capital until 8.50pm due to a lack of seats available on the next flights – and didn’t get to the city centre itself until 11pm.
She said: ‘I was distraught because I needed to get on that plane in order to get to my gig last night, which of course I missed.
‘People had bought tickets and they were sitting there waiting for me and I didn’t make it.’
The ordeal left both her and another deserted wheelchair passenger feeling ‘really, really stressed’, she said.
Mrs Weir said the ordeal left her in tears feeling ‘very, very stressed’ (Picture: Liz Weir)
‘You just don’t believe this is possible,’ she added. ‘But also I didn’t think it was possible for them to take luggage and not take the passenger with the luggage.’
She also wrote on X that it left her in tears. ‘I did cry. A lot!’ she wrote. ‘And noisily. Not good for the stress levels.’
An easyJet spokesperson said: ‘We are very sorry that flight EZY55 from Belfast to Edinburgh on Friday 21 June departed without three passengers who were being accompanied by the airport’s special assistance provider.
‘We have urgently raised with the provider and our ground handling team to understand why this happened.
‘We are doing everything possible to assist the passengers, arranging for flights to Glasgow and Edinburgh later this evening to get them to their destination as quickly as possible, and our team looked after them throughout and provided them with refreshment vouchers while they waited for their new flight.
‘We will also be processing the compensation they are due.
‘The wellbeing of our customers is our highest priority and we are very sorry for the inconvenience this will have caused.’
In other air travel related nightmares, a British Airways flight from London to Texas made it all the way to Canada last week before turning around and going all the way back to the UK due to a technical fault.
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