New flights for 20 000 Qatar Airways passengers within 24 hours, CEO says
Qatar Airways said on Wednesday that all of the roughly 20 000 passengers who were on flights that were diverted on Monday night after Iran fired missiles towards a US military base in the Gulf country were put on new flights within 24 hours.
Iran launched a missile attack on Al Udeid Air Base in Doha after the U.S. joined Israel's attacks on Iranian nuclear sites, threatening a further escalation in regional tensions before a ceasefire between Iran and Israel was announced.
The attack forced Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain to shut their airspace temporarily while Dubai's two airports in the United Arab Emirates briefly halted operations.
The closures created a backlog of thousands of passengers at Doha's Hamad International Airport who queued for hours, facing long delays and flight cancellations.
"All passengers from diverted flights — approximately 20 000 in total — were cleared within 24 hours," Qatar Airways CEO Badr Mohammed Al-Meer said in an open letter posted on X. "More than 11 000 resumed their journeys during the morning wave on 24 June, with the remainder departing through the evening wave and morning bank on 25 June. As of today, there are no passengers from diverted flights left stranded."
Traffic at the airport on Wednesday was regular with minimal delays and no crowds, according to a Reuters witness.
Al-Meer said that at the time of the attack, over 90 Qatar Airways flights heading to Doha "were forced to divert immediately" while more than 10 000 passengers were already in transit at Doha's airport.
The airline, which carried just over 43 million passengers in the year to the end of March, activated its business continuity plans, increasing capacity to destinations with high volumes of displaced passengers, in response to the turmoil following the attack, he added.
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