A Jet2 flight to Bristol was delayed by around four hours on Sunday 16 August after boarding stairs collided with the aircraft's wing tip at Palma de Mallorca, forcing passengers to disembark while the plane was checked over.
Flight LS1872, a Jet2Holidays service on a Boeing 737-800 carrying up to 189 passengers, had been due to leave Palma at 10:25am local time. Passengers had already boarded and were told the departure would be pushed back roughly two hours because of an air traffic restriction. Shortly after being told they were clear to go, a ground-stairs vehicle struck the wing tip, and everyone was sent back into the terminal.
One passenger, named Finley, described the moment to Bristol Live: "I'm in Palma airport and a ground stairs vehicle has just hit the wing tip of our Jet2Holidays B737 Max 8 aircraft." He said passengers waited roughly another hour before being told they could reboard.
The flight eventually departed at around 3pm local time (2pm UK time), landing in Bristol about four hours later than scheduled. Finley told Bristol Live the ordeal had been "a nightmare," having set off for the airport at 7.30am that morning only to board twice over the course of six hours.
Bristol Live and the Express both reported the incident on Sunday. Bristol Live said it had approached Jet2 Holidays for comment; no airline statement had been published by either outlet at the time of writing.
The delay was confined to this single inbound flight rather than wider Bristol Airport operations, and there is no indication of disruption to other services. Passengers due to me