Passengers entitled to compensation despite short delay and rerouting of flight to another airport due to severe weather – New ruling from the Eastern High Court

Air passengers awarded compensation despite flight diversion and a short delay of only 3 hours and 50 minutes. Requiring proof of severe weather from an independent third party.

Today, lawyer Eva Persson has won a landmark case at the Eastern High Court.

The case concerns heavy storms and even a diversion of the aircraft on a previous rotation:

On August 7, 2019, the aircraft was scheduled to operate on the routes Edinburgh-Nantes, Nantes-Edinburgh, Edinburgh-Beziers, Beziers-Edinburgh, Edinburgh-Copenhagen and Copenhagen-Edinburgh.

However, on the Beziers-Edinburgh route, the flight was diverted to Glasgow due to severe weather.

This caused a delay of 3 hours and 50 minutes on the next route (Edinburgh-Copenhagen) for which passengers had tickets.

In the case, the High Court attached decisive importance to the fact that Ryanair had not (even before the High Court) proved that the delay was due to “extraordinary circumstances”, as no external statements had been presented to support the airline’s view that the weather conditions in Edinburgh were of such an extraordinary nature.

In other words, the High Court once again established that Ryanair cannot simply present printouts from its own IT systems or statements from its own pilots and business partners if Ryanair wants to lift the burden of proof that there are “extraordinary circumstances” within the meaning of the Aviation Regulation. This burden of proof can only be lifted if statements or similar from an independent third party are presented.