From Manchester to the Portuguese island of Madeira in 60 hours by air and not by sea? Feasible and exactly what happened to the passengers of Tui Airways flight BY2536.
On January 12, 2024, the Boeing 737-800, which has the registration G-TAWM, was scheduled to fly from Manchester to Funchal. The departure at around 8:48 a.m. local time was still largely on time, but there was bad news during the flight: Due to acute bad weather, the pilots had to make an alternative landing at Porto Santo Airport.
The Tui Airways jet should then wait there and fly on to Funchal the next day. In any case, the take-off was successful, but landing on the island of Madeira was out of the question because landing was again impossible due to acute bad weather. The G-TAWM had to divert again, this time to Tenerife South Airport.
After about four hours of waiting at the Canary Islands airport, the medium-haul jet took off again for Funchal, but again it didn't work. The pilots circled over Madeira and the Atlantic for around three hours, but the weather situation did not improve, so they returned to Tenerife South Airport. The passengers were taken to a hotel overnight. A new attempt was made on Sunday, January 14, 2024.
However, the G-TAWM did not take off in the morning, but rather in the late evening. Shortly before 21:30 p.m. the Boeing 737-800 actually touched down at Funchal Airport - around 60 hours late and three alternative landings. The island of Madeira is known for the fact that air traffic can be very difficult or even impossible when the weather conditions are right. Alternative landings are therefore not uncommon at all, because the safety of passengers, crew and aircraft is a priority.
Just a few weeks ago there was a domestic flight from Tap Air Portugal comparable problems. Due to bad weather, landing in Lajes was repeatedly not possible, so we had to divert to Ponta Delgada or Lisbon several times. The passengers were on the road for 33,5 hours and even had four alternative landings.
and 