Heavy Rain, Repairs Delay Manchester Flights

Dozens of flights at Manchester Airport were delayed on Monday, December 15, due to heavy rain causing poor visibility and the temporary closure of one runway for taxiway repairs, stranding thousands of passengers during the busy holiday travel season.

The disruptions affected both arrivals and departures, with airlines including Ryanair, easyJet, British Airways, Aer Lingus, and KLM reporting delays ranging from 25 minutes to several hours. One runway, identified as 05L/23R, was closed for several hours to address a surface failure on an adjacent taxiway, a minor defect that engineers repaired amid worsening weather conditions. Air traffic controllers capped the number of inbound flights to manage congestion, leading to some aircraft circling or holding on the ground before landing. For instance, a Ryanair flight from Belfast International, originally scheduled for 7:50 a.m., departed nearly two hours late and circled for an additional 20 minutes before touching down, which in turn delayed its onward journey to Tirana, Albania. Similarly, an easyJet flight from Belfast City arrived about two hours behind schedule after a comparable holding pattern.