Passengers have been advised to check for possible delays before travelling after Gatwick airport closed its main runway following claims the surface started to break up.
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Up to 20 flights were diverted to other airports including Stansted and Luton while others were cancelled or delayed.
A Gatwick spokesman said: “Our main runway was temporarily closed at 15.48 while we investigated a reported issue”.
The runway was declared fit for use at around 1900 hours local time, but the airport, which handles more than 100,000 passengers daily, saw a significant passenger backlog at its departure terminals.
Despite flights having been allowed to take off and land at the West Sussex airport within an hour, Evans said there were continued delays and that his flight was on course to depart about three hours behind schedule.
On Sunday she said: ‘My flight to Barcelona was cancelled at 4.50pm and we’ve been here in the terminal since.
“Everyone is losing their cool”.
Passengers whose Monarch Airlines’ flight from Antalya to Gatwick was one of those diverted to Luton complained after cabin crew refused to sell them drinks and snacks while they waited on the tarmac to continue their journey. The safety and security of our airport and passengers is our number one priority, but we’d like to apologise to passengers impacted today.
Thousands of passengers were left stranded airside, while 17 flights were diverted to other airports.
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She said: “We haven’t been able to get near the information point. So now we’re sat on the tarmac at Stansted waiting to be told what is going on”.
