Edinburgh Airport experienced significant disruption on Friday, 26 June, as severe thunderstorms swept across the UK, forcing numerous flight diversions and cancellations. The Met Office recorded thousands of lightning strikes across the central belt since the early hours, leading to widespread travel chaos.
Flight Diversions and Cancellations
A British Airways service from Edinburgh to London City was cancelled, while multiple other flights were rerouted or delayed. Incoming services from Porto, London, Chicago, New York, Dublin, and Riga were redirected to airports across the UK and Ireland, including Glasgow, Newcastle, Liverpool, Manchester, and Dublin.
Flight tracking application FlightRadar24 indicated that Edinburgh Airport ranked as the fifth-most disrupted airport globally on Friday morning.
Delays and Rerouting Details
Ryanair was forced to reroute a Porto service to Newcastle as storms arrived around 3am. Numerous departing and arriving flights faced delays of up to three hours. Services from London City, Chicago O'Hare, and Dublin were redirected to Glasgow. A British Airways flight from Heathrow, scheduled to land at 8.25am, was rerouted back to London. Flights from Vienna and Riga were diverted to Liverpool and Manchester, respectively, while a JetBlue service from New York JFK was rerouted to Dublin.
Airport Statement
A spokesperson for Edinburgh Airport said: "Air traffic services at Edinburgh Airport are managing the impacts from earlier disruption due to severe thunderstorms in the local and surrounding airspace. This situation has improved from the worst of the weather this morning but it likely this will have knock-on impacts throughout the day and passengers are advised to contact their airline for the latest travel information."
Passengers were urged to check with their airlines for updates as residual delays were expected to continue throughout the day.
