Chaos at Manchester Airport: Runway shutdown, rain cause major delays

Thousands of passengers faced severe disruption at Manchester Airport on Monday, December 15, after a runway was forced to close for emergency repairs, compounded by torrential rain and poor visibility that triggered a Met Office weather warning.

Manchester airport, which is considered as UK’s third-busiest airport was thrown into chaos when one of its two runways was shut due to a “surface failure” on a connecting taxiway.

Engineers were working rigorously to repair the fault but heavy rainfall across Greater Manchester significantly slowed progress and reduced visibility, forcing air traffic controllers to cap the number of inbound flights.

Passengers face an average of 70 minutes delay with dozens of flights postponed by several hours and at least two cancellations confirmed by midday.

Notable disruptions include:

• A Ryanair flight to Berlin FR1145 (delayed for over five hours until 4:45 p.m.)
• An easyJet service to Paris (U22107) set for 12:30 p.m. was cancelled.
• A Ryanair flight to Gdansk, Poland (FR4094), faced a nearly six-hour delay, pushing its departure to 7:00 p.m.
• Long-haul carriers such as British Airways, Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines, and Finnair all reported significant delays on key European routes.

Flight tracking service Flightradar also confirmed that “Runway 05L/23R at Manchester airport is closed due to a surface failure.”

The chaos erupted days before the airport's busiest Christmas travel period with over 1.5 million passengers expected between December 19 and January 4.