Air travel across the world remained heavily disrupted on Sunday, with thousands of flights cancelled and tens of thousands of travellers left stranded, on a second day of chaos sparked by the US and Israeli attacks on Iran.
Airports in Dubai, the world’s busiest terminal, and Doha remained closed while airlines across the Middle East cancelled almost all of their flights on Sunday. Some Dubai residents sought to leave the city or take shelter after a night punctuated by loud aerial interceptions.
Iranian missiles and drones on Saturday and early Sunday targeted the airports of Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait City and Manama in Bahrain, causing limited damage to terminal facilities. One person died and seven were injured in the attack on Abu Dhabi’s Zayed International.
Airspace across Qatar, Iran and Iraq remained closed on Sunday, with other long-haul aircraft avoiding the region entirely.
Qatar Airways, which operates out of Doha, said it “will resume operations once the Qatar Civil Aviation Authority announces the safe reopening of Qatari airspace”.
Emirates, which operates from Dubai, said it had suspended all flights until 3pm UAE time (11am UK time) on Monday. Passengers “can rebook on another flight to your intended destination up to 20 days from your original date of travel”, it said.
International airlines, from British Airways to Air France, cancelled flights into the region on Sunday. Close to 2,000 flights were axed on Saturday, according to data group Cirium. Some 4,000 flights were scheduled for Sunday, it said, of which more than 1,500 had been cancelled by 1pm UK time.
The UK Foreign Office advised against “all but essential travel” to the United Arab Emirates.
The Middle Eastern hubs are a major travel artery, with millions of passengers travelling between Asia and Europe or America using the centres for connecting flights.
The Gulf carriers have built business models on connecting passengers in the region, while the major airports are undergoing significant expansion plans in anticipation of strong travel growth through the region in the decades ahead.
While airlines have to book passengers on alternative routes, the gridlock in the global air system — and the lack of alternative capacity — meant that tens of thousands were left stranded on Sunday. The UAE Civil Aviation Authority said it would cover accommodation and food costs for stranded passengers.
Even if airspace reopens, the ripple effects of the chaos will take days to clear, with airline networks disrupted by planes and crews being in the wrong locations.
Anyone trying to leave the Middle East, particularly Dubai, which has become a thriving centre for expatriates, also faces few options, with the region’s major airports closed.
Some residents of Dubai have driven to the border with Oman in the hope of crossing out of the country. While most roads were quieter than usual, roads to the sultanate, which has been struck only once so far, were busy.
Eddie, a British expat living in Dubai, said he drove his family to Hatta, a border town, on Sunday, where he found UAE residents who were trying to “wait it out . . . trying to get away from the main cities”.
He said some residents spent the night in vehicles sitting in car parks for protection. “Most of us were just trying to barricade in the innermost part of buildings, whether that was the bathroom or a different area,” he added. People in the city are on “super high alert”.
Others have already made it across the border into Oman, where hotels are busier than usual with Dubai residents.
After a drone strike hit the Fairmont hotel on the man-made Palm Jumeirah in Dubai, some guests in a neighbouring hotel had to spend the night on makeshift beds in the basement. They were moving to another hotel on the outskirts of the city, which they felt would be safer.
Supermarkets were packed on Sunday as people left their homes to stock up on supplies. Residents said supplies of basics such as meat, dairy and rice were running low. In scenes reminiscent of the Covid pandemic, toilet paper was also in scant supply.
Megan, another Dubai-based British expat, said mobile phones received an alert at 12.30am today, and again at 8am. She described the city as quiet today, with few cars and half-empty supermarket shelves, after the initial “flurry of panic”.
Despite schools shutting down for three days and companies asking employees to work from home, she believes “things will settle down fast”.
“There is definitely a sense of confidence in the government’s ability to defend people from any aerial threats and this is not an entirely unexpected scenario after what happened last year in other parts of the Gulf,” she added.
With a sense of levity, another international Dubai resident remarked that parking in the normally crowded city was “a lot easier” on Sunday.
The US embassy in Bahrain has advised Americans to avoid hotels
in Manama, saying they could be targets for future attacks.
In a security alert posted on X it said it was tracking reports that the Crowne Plaza hotel in Manama had been struck earlier on Sunday. Videos on social media have shown purported damage to the
popular hotel.