TUI flight from Newcastle to Cancun diverted to Glasgow

The TUI flight, codenamed TOM726, took off from Newcastle Airport shortly after 1pm on Monday (July 31) bound for the Mexican city of Cancun.

But shortly after taking off the plane, a state-of-the-art Boeing 787 Dreamliner, changed course to head for Glasgow where it landed half an hour later.

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TUI said that the diversion was caused by “weather conditions” in Newcastle meaning the plane required an extra stop to refuel.

The flight took off from Glasgow at around 3.30pm and arrived in Mexico around nine hours later.

The airline has since apologised to customers for the delay.

A spokesperson said: “We would like to apologise to customers for the disruption to flight TOM726 from Newcastle to Cancun.

“Unfortunately, due to weather conditions at Newcastle Airport affecting the performance of the aircraft, the flight was forced to make a stop at Glasgow in order to pick additional fuel for the onward journey.

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“The flight has now left Glasgow on its way to Cancun.”

It comes just more than a week after a TUI flight returning to Newcastle Airport from Tunisia was diverted to Manchester due to “unfavourable” weather conditions.

On Monday it was announced that Dutch airline KLM would up its number of flights from Newcastle to five times a day.