THE first flight between America and the North-East since the terrorist tragedy is due in today.

A Britannia charter flight from Florida is expected to touch down at Newcastle Airport at about 1.10pm, bringing holidaymakers who had been due to leave the US on Thursday.

Newcastle Airport is telling passengers that the only hand luggage allowed will be women's small handbags that should only contain documents, passports and money.

Britannia is not allowing hand luggage and is advising passengers to take documents in clear plastic bags.

Other major airports were returning to normal yesterday as efforts by airline staff over the weekend to get passengers on their transatlantic flight begun to pay off.

The majority of services to the US and Canada were back in the air as airlines worked their way through the backlog of thousands of stranded travellers .

But Heathrow was still busy with people queuing outside terminals as the new security checks caused delays.