Thousands stranded again after fog causes flight chaos.

Disruption caused by thick fog continued at airports yesterday, the airport's busiest day of the holiday period.

- SIMON CALDER

An estimated 20,000 people had their flights cancelled to and from London airports, adding to the frustrated hordes whose planes were grounded on Friday and Saturday.

At least 70 flights to and from Gatwick were cancelled yesterday, along with more than 50 at Heathrow. Others were heavily delayed or diverted.

Gatwick and Heathrow were respectively the busiest singlerunway airport and two-runway airport in the world.

Flights from London Gatwick to Edinburgh yesterday revealed how schedules unravelled. The first easyJet departure to the Scottish capital left on time at 8am. The next, at 12.55pm, was an hour late. The third and fourth were four hours and two hours late respectively. And the fifth and sixth were cancelled at short notice.

One passenger at Edinburgh, Ewan Somerville, had been waiting to fly to Gatwick since 8pm on Saturday.

“The delay was creeping up until it finally cancelled,” he said. “There’s nobody to speak to at easyJet if you’re not at the airport. So I trekked out to the airport. It was chaos. Eventually they organised a hotel.

“They rescheduled the flight for 5pm today. Again, this afternoon the delay has been creeping up. Bang on five, they said it would be 6.45pm. Then they said on the Tannoy, erroneously, that the flight had been cancelled.

“One passenger was in tears to her family and a couple said they were going to rent a car and drive to London.”