Extraordinary Circumstances: How They Affect Compensation

What Are Extraordinary Circumstances

Simply put, extraordinary circumstances are events outside the airlines’ control that lead to flight disruptions like flight delays and cancellations and even denied boarding. This might seem like a handy way for carriers to avoid paying passengers flight delay compensation, but extraordinary circumstances are more than just an excuse for delays and cancellations. In fact they can usually be defined as an event that could not be avoided or prevented despite the airline’s best efforts.

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Examples of Extraordinary Circumstances

1. Dangerous weather including severe thunderstorms, hurricanes, blizzards, dense fog, or other sudden conditions that can create safety concerns and lead to delays and cancellations.
2. Bird strikes where a bird (or sometimes other wildlife) collides with the airplane and causes damage. This leads to follow-up maintenance that was unscheduled and can result in disrupted flights.
3. Issues with air traffic control such as employee strikes or restrictions caused by airspace congestion.
4. Airport strikes
5. Airport problems such as damaged runways or technical failures that are beyond the airline’s control
6. Medical emergencies where the aircraft must be diverted or forced to land to address the issue. 
7. Natural Disasters including volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, floods, and tsunamis
8. Security threats/risks that lead to airport lockdowns or flight restrictions. This can also include unruly passengers whose behaviour necessitates a diversion or emergency landing.
9. Political unrest like wars, severe political instability, travel bans, and civil unrest.
10. Unforeseen natural phenomena, also called Acts of God, like volcanic ash clouds or other sudden and unforeseen natural events that lead to flight disruptions.
11. Manufacturers defects with the aircraft that are outside the scope of routine maintenance.

Common Misconceptions

There are some situations that can seem confusing when trying to figure out if extraordinary circumstances apply.

• Crew shortages, for example, are commonly believed to be outside the airline’s control. But this isn’t the case. In fact, staffing issues, including airline strikes and other scheduling problems, do not fall into the category of extraordinary situations because carriers are expected to prevent staffing related flight disruptions.  
• Technical issues are another cause for delays and cancellations that can seem beyond the airline’s control. But again, airlines are expected to carry out routine maintenance on their aircraft to prevent such problems from arising. The only time a technical problem could qualify as an extraordinary circumstance is when it was caused by a manufacturer’s defect or if a safety concern arises that wasn’t something that the airline could have foreseen or prevented.
• Overbooked flights, where passengers are involuntarily denied boarding, are commonly seen as beyond the airline’s control. This couldn’t be further from the truth as airlines routinely overbook flights as a way to offset any last minute cancellations and maximise profits.

One exception to this could be if a safety issue arose in the originally scheduled aircraft that caused the carrier to switch to a smaller plane. If this happens then the denied boarding incident is attributed to the safety concern and not to overbooking.

How it Affects on Airline Compensation

In Canada, the United Kingdom, and the European Union, where airlines are required to compensate passengers for certain flight disruptions, extraordinary circumstances can exempt airlines from compensating passengers. This is because of the understanding that airlines are unable to control these situations and should not be held accountable for delays or cancellations that happen as a result.

At the same time, however, airlines are still required to provide assistance to their passengers by offering food, drink, accommodation, refunds, and alternate flights depending on the situation.

United States

The US Department of Transportation is responsible for overseeing passenger rights in the United States, but unlike the EU, UK, and Canada, the US has no federal laws requiring airlines to compensate passengers for flight disruptions. So, when it comes to extraordinary circumstances, each airline will outline how it will take care of passengers in their contract of carriage. Most legacy airlines in the US will help passengers by offering alternative flights and care at the airport, but again, each airline has its own policies.

United Kingdom and the European Union

The air passenger rights regulations in both the UK and EU make provisions for passengers affected by flight delays and cancellations. EU and UK 261/2004 both stipulate that airlines compensate passengers for flight disruptions, but if extraordinary circumstances are at play then they can avoid making compensation payouts. Regardless of what caused the flight disruption, the carrier must still provide you care and assistance as well as alternate flights and refunds depending on the situation. 

Canada

As with the UK and EU, Canada requires airlines to compensate passengers for delays and cancellations unless extraordinary circumstances are to blame for the disruption. The Air Passenger Protection Regulations (APPR) that is governed by the Canadian Transport Agency (CTA) outlines passenger rights and requires carriers to give passengers care, assistance, refunds, and alternate bookings when flight disruptions occur, even if they are the result of extraordinary circumstances.

What You Can Do

Unless you’re travelling in the United States, extraordinary circumstances can play a big role in whether or not you receive airline compensation. As you can see, it helps to understand what counts as extraordinary and unavoidable as airlines have been known to use these events as a way of evading compensation. So, even though air passenger rights regulations can vary among countries, the basic principle remains. 

If you have a flight delay or cancellation, find out immediately what caused the disruption and keep as much detailed information about the event as possible. Ask airport and airline staff about what happened, check social channels and other airlines to see if the disruption was limited to the airline or if it affected everyone in the airport.

If there are widespread delays and cancellations, chances are it was caused by an extraordinary circumstance.

Tools to Help You Out

See our list of FREE tools in the links below:

• Online Flight Delay Checker
• Free Flight Delay Compensation Calculator
• Free Flight Delay Compensation Letter Template

Resources & Additional Reading

Some extra resources to help you better understand flight delay compensation:

• Delayed Flight Compensation Claim Deadlines 
• What are Delay Reversals?
• Should I Accept Cash or Vouchers for a Delayed Flight?
• Business Trip Flight Delay Guide

Other Common Flight Delay Causes

Read more about the most popular flight delay causes:

• Flight Delay due to Weather
• Flight Delay due to Diversion
• Flight Delay due to Aircraft Maintenance
• Flight Delay due to Overfueling

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