The late afternoon Emirates flight from London Heathrow to Dubai has an advertised connection to Bangkok of just one hour. Normally 60 minutes is sufficient for extricating passengers (and, separately, their checked baggage) from the world’s biggest passenger plane, the A380, and enabling them to board another SuperJumbo at a different gate at the airport that handles more international travellers than any in the world, all in the early hours of the morning.
But the remarkable, unrelenting choreography that allows millions of passengers to connect every day at Dubai, Doha, Abu Dhabi and many other hubs is under severe strain as a result of the unfolding humanitarian crisis in Lebanon.
With Russian and Ukrainian skies closed to Western aircraft, the options for flying from Europe to Asia seem to be narrowing by the day.
Airlines flying from Europe to the Gulf on Tuesday night into Wednesday experienced severe disruption, with Emirates and Qatar Airways – the two biggest Middle East carriers – diverting dozens of flights.
With many planes typically arriving at their destinations in Dubai and Doha several hours late, the carefully planned deployment of aircraft and crew was thrown into disarray.
Closed skies over Iraq and Iran saw some unusual manoeuvres, including an Air France jet from Paris to Mumbai that turned around over northern Iraq and flew back to Charles de Gaulle airport.
British Airways, too, was affected – with a London Heathrow to Dubai plane diverting late in its journey to Larnaca in Cyprus to refuel, and a Singapore-Heathrow flight that diverted to Dubai as its normal route was closed.
These are the key questions and answers.
What are the normal routes from Europe to the Gulf and south Asia?
Typically a plane will route over Germany, Austria and the Balkans to Turkey, flying the length of the country and turning southeast after passing Syria. Depending on the airline and its policies, the usual route is then over Iraq or Iran to the Gulf.
What has changed?
Since airspace was closed due to the Iranian missile attack, airlines are taking much longer routings. For example, the early morning Qatar Airways flight QR12 arrival at Doha today from London Heathrow flew southeast to Athens, over the eastern Mediterranean to Egypt, over the Sinai peninsula to the Red Sea, turning east to fly over the middle of Saudi Arabia.
The extra distance of about 500 miles added an hour to the flight time. Along with the delay reaching London, the plane was 90 minutes late arriving at a hub where many connections are less than that.
There is often a bit of wiggle room: if a significant number of passengers on a delayed flight are transferring to a specific departure from Dubai or Doha, the latter may be held back to allow them to connect.
What happens if I miss a connection?
The scale of the challenge is immense. For example, on Thursday morning none of the first 20 arrivals from western Europe to Doha airport was on time, with some delayed up to three hours.
On a journey from the UK, the airline becomes legally liable for providing meals (and accommodation if necessary) until it gets you to your destination, and may also need to pay compensation if the hold-up is within its control. The current conflict counts as an “extraordinary circumstance” and no compensation is payable.
As a result of all the missed connections and cancellations, passengers may be waiting at the hubs for several days for onward flights.
While UK-originating travellers can press their entitlement to be flown to their final destination as soon as possible, the same rules do not apply on a non-British/European airline such as Emirates or Qatar Airways when flying from outside the UK/EU.
Is there further disruption for people who are not changing planes?
Yes. Every airline operating in the region is having to cope with longer flight times, which reverberate through the system. For example, the Singapore Airlines A380 SuperJumbo from the city-state to London Heathrow must thread a complicated course over India, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan, taking much longer than the ideal flight plan – which would traverse southern Russia.
British Airways’ link from London Heathrow to Mumbai and back, which normally flies over Iraq, is cancelled on 2, 3 and 4 October.