A plane was forced to abort its landing at Wellington Airport and return to Auckland as wind, rain and fog continues to cause disruptions to flights across the country.
Multiple flights have been cancelled in and out of Auckland, Wellington, Nelson, New Plymouth and other centres as torrential rain bears down on parts of the country during the school holidays.
In a press release, Air New Zealand said Wellington, New Plymouth and Nelson are currently the worst affected ports, while Auckland, Whangārei, Kerikeri, Hamilton, Tauranga, Rotorua, Gisborne and Timaru have also been impacted.
It’s expected to cause “flow on impact across the wider domestic network”.
Multiple regional turbo-prop services have been cancelled or significantly delayed this morning due to the wild weather, with the disruption likely to impact the schedule for much of the day and into Sunday.
Several travellers who spoke to 1 NEWS said they had attempted to get on flights up to three or four times, only to be taken off planes.
At least one flight was forced to abort its landing. Two travellers who were on the plane, which was forced to return to Auckland Airport after an aborted landing at Wellington Airport, told 1 NEWS about the scary flight.
“We were going in and it’s going up and down and side to side and there’s people being sick in the back so yeah, it was not good,” one woman said.
“We just touched down, the wheel just touched the tarmac – we went flying right up,” another added. “Bit like a movie!”
One young traveller described the scene as “really windy and it was like turbulence and everyone was, like, bumping about the cabins”.
Air New Zealand said customers affected by the cancellations are being offered road transportation options where possible. The airline is also adding additional services to its schedule tomorrow.
"Jet services are currently operating largely as normal with some delays into and out of Auckland."
Customers booked to travel domestically today have been advised to stay up to date with flight disruptions through Air New Zealand’s arrivals and departures page.
Customers who no longer need to travel automatically have the option to transfer to another flight within 72 hours or hold their fare value in credit for up to 12 months toward future travel, the airline said.
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