German travel giant TUI said on Tuesday it planned to start flying home thousands of tourists stranded on two cruise ships in the Gulf due to the Middle East war.
The ships are located at Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates and Doha, Qatar.
They carry about 7,000 passengers and crew in total, according to the German Shipping Association.
“Repatriation is our responsibility, which we take very seriously,” TUI boss Sebastian Ebel told public broadcaster ZDF.
He said the company was working with carriers including Etihad, Emirates and Qatar Airways.
“Everything is organised but when you have 5,000 customers on ships and each plane has only 200 seats, it takes time.”
Speaking separately to NTV, Ebel said that TUI had about 10,000 customers on holidays in the region in total, including those not on cruise ships but staying in hotels.
“We hope that we can begin the repatriation operation today,” he said.
Tuifly, the company’s own airline, also had planes ready to “fly there as soon as we receive permission and pick up customers as quickly as possible”, he said.
Tourists have been affected by the biggest disruption to global travel since the Covid pandemic after US-Israeli struck Iran, killing supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Tehran responded against US-linked targets in the Middle East.
In total, roughly 30,000 German tourists are stranded across the Middle East at a time when thousands of flights have been cancelled.
Germany’s government said on Monday it would send charter flights to Saudi Arabia and Oman to evacuate the most vulnerable travellers, including children, the elderly and pregnant women.
The foreign ministry said it was working with TUI, airline group Lufthansa and the German Travel Association.
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