A flight carrying British cruise-goers from Barbados to Manchester was forced to divert to Bermuda after an incident of extreme turbulence two days before Christmas. There were 225 passengers onboard the Airbus A330-200 operated by Maleth Aero, a Maltese charter airline. When the aircraft landed, 11 people were transported to a local hospital to treat minor injuries, according to the BBC. Everyone ended up spending the holiday stranded in Bermuda, as it took days to arrange a replacement flight.
Maleth Aero Flight 1975 hit severe clear-air turbulence two hours into the nearly nine-hour flight. The incident lasted less than a minute but created chaos in the passenger cabin. A woman onboard told the Manchester Evening News, “We were about two hours into the flight and everything was fine — some people were sitting down, but some were in the toilets and staff were serving drinks. Then all of a sudden the plane literally just dropped.” An image that circulated on social media showed a galley cart overturned in the aisle. Thankfully, none of the 13 crew members were injured.
The Airbus A330 wasn’t able to leave Bermuda until today due to checks to ensure the aircraft’s safety. P&O Cruises, the company that chartered the flight, released a statement reading:
“Following freak (unexpected) turbulence, a flight from Barbados to Manchester was diverted to Bermuda on Sunday morning. We are very sorry for this disruption to the journey following their holiday and we worked round the clock with the airline and hotels to take care of the guests, and to ensure they get home as soon as possible.”
According to the Independent, P&O faced criticism from customers earlier in the year for partnering with a Maltese carrier instead of a British carrier like British Airways, Virgin Atlantic or TUI Airways. Maleth Air meets all of the European Union’s stringent safety standards and has only had one other incident over the Atlantic. In 2020, a Maleth briefly lost contact with the Gander Oceanic control center during a flight from Britain to JFK in New York due to severe turbulence.