Hey, you have to give Eurowings credit for getting passengers to their destination, even if the mode of transport wasn’t what was expected…
In this post:
Santorini-bound Eurowings flight diverts to Heraklion
aeroTELEGRAPH reports on an interesting situation that happened on Sunday, August 31, 2025, on Eurowings flight EW9662, scheduled to operate from Dusseldorf (DUS) to Santorini (JTR). The 1,381-mile flight from Lufthansa Group’s low cost regional subsidiary was operated by an Airbus A319 with the registration code D-AGWM, and was supposed to depart at 6:55AM and arrive at 11:05AM.
The flight was mostly routine, until it came time for the approach to Santorini. The plane descended as usual, and got to an altitude as low as roughly 500 feet. However, the crosswinds exceeded the permissible limits for the plane, so a landing wasn’t possible. With no signs of conditions improving, the decision was made to divert to Heraklion (HER), on the island of Crete.
So the plane made that 75-mile journey, and it landed there at 11:30AM, after a total flight time of 3hr5min. The plan was initially to refuel and then continue the journey to Santorini. However, when the weather showed no signs of improvement, the airline got creative.
Passengers were disembarked, and were then rebooked on a ferry for this portion of the journey, so that they’d make it to their destination. The A319 then flew back to Dusseldorf empty (with just the crew), and it landed there at 5:53PM.
This seems like a great way to handle this situation
Airline operations can be incredibly complex at times:
- There’s only so much that can be done to predict weather, especially when we’re talking about winds on Greek islands, plus aircraft operational limits
- There are limits to how many hours airline crews are allowed to work in a day, so when there’s a diversion, often decisions need to be made quickly, to have the best outcome for the most people
With that in mind, I think Eurowings handled this situation spectacularly well, all things considered. Flying to Santorini wasn’t an option, so the airline got creative and got everyone to their destination on a ferry, even if it was several hours late.
You might think “well of course, what else would they have done?” In many situations, airlines will essentially force passengers to stay on the plane, and will sometimes even return everyone to their origin, and regroup there. For example, Condor dealt with a similar situation earlier in the summer, but handled it very differently. It ultimately resulted in a 32-hour journey to nowhere, with a total of five landings.
So I think the way that Eurowings handled this is most definitely preferable, in terms of getting as many people to their destination as possible, while minimizing a plane being out of sequence, crew timing out, etc.
Bottom line
A Eurowings flight from Dusseldorf to Santorini didn’t go as planned, as strong crosswinds in Santorini exceeded the plane’s operational limits. At that point the decision was made to divert to Heraklion, the closest airport where a landing was possible.
With conditions not improving, the decision was made to send passengers to Santorini on a ferry, and then fly the plane back to Dusseldorf empty. As unconventional as it may be, that’s about the best outcome anyone could hope for, and it’s rare to see airlines get this creative.
What do you make of this Eurowings diversion?
No mention is made of the fate of the passengers who were waiting to board that flight in Santorini to return to Germany.
I can't get my head around the fact that there are some ferries covering the trip in just 90 minutes. That is FAST!!
It’s just 59 nautical miles and they are not conventional ferries but special High Speed catamarans. Nevertheless, departures are always in the morning so I don’t see how the described scenario would have worked out without an overnight stay in Heraklion for the passengers. There’s something missing to the story here…
They sent another plane from Dusseldorf (called it Flight 6901) which left Santorini at 1:10pm Monday instead of the scheduled 12:10pm Sunday.
Damn it Ben, At first I expected to see a horror story about them being booked on an overnight Greek ferry (I still have trauma from the one I took to Santorini 22 years ago), but alas… it was only 75 miles!
That’s like a pleasure cruise!
My take away was the same as most… how lucky they are that this solution was offered. And then I thought how bad it could have been...
Damn it Ben, At first I expected to see a horror story about them being booked on an overnight Greek ferry (I still have trauma from the one I took to Santorini 22 years ago), but alas… it was only 75 miles!
That’s like a pleasure cruise!
My take away was the same as most… how lucky they are that this solution was offered. And then I thought how bad it could have been if the local transport options weren’t so well known by everyone in Europe, and thus I’m assuming all of those involved in the solution.
The overnights are that bad? I took the ferry from Heraklion to Santorini once. It wasn’t luxurious but was definitely comfortable.
An overnight ferry in Greece is fine if you can get a cabin booked.
It's not luxurious, but you get a cabin with bed and shower. I found the food in the sit-down restaurant very tasty as well, if a little overpriced (by Greek standards, not by more expensive European standards).
If you can't get a cabin, the seats in the public spaces are awful.
I live in a coastal area that gets heavy fog every December. All the station managers at local airports know who to get in touch with at local charter bus companies for those 50-150 final miles on land after yet another aircraft diversion due to fog
One wonders whether Eurowings was more inclined to figure out this creative solution due to EU duty of care regulations that would have had them on the hook for high season rooms and meals in Crete where they may not have contracts for irregular operations.
This is out of the airline's control, it was due to the Weather (surface winds/crosswinds). Is EU duty of care regulations, you mentioned, including things like outside of the airline's control?
Monetary compensation is only for cases within the airline's control but duty of care is for all cases where passengers are stranded regardless of cause or blame. No personal experience, but pretty sure that's the law.
The cash compensation would not apply in this case. "Duty of care", however, does apply.
I think these sorts of creative solutions are more common than you think. My mom was once faced with a long delay on a flight from Monterey to San Francisco - a distance of 77 miles. She would have missed her connecting flight, which was much longer. The passenger in front of her in line at the counter managed to get United to pay for a taxi to SFO, so she asked him if she...
I think these sorts of creative solutions are more common than you think. My mom was once faced with a long delay on a flight from Monterey to San Francisco - a distance of 77 miles. She would have missed her connecting flight, which was much longer. The passenger in front of her in line at the counter managed to get United to pay for a taxi to SFO, so she asked him if she could share. In the end, 3 or 4 passengers shared the taxi and she made it onto the next flight out of SFO.
I don't know if UA proactively offered the taxi option - but it was available for the asking, apparently.
I had a similar experience with USAirways...Philadelphia to Harrisburg diverted to Lancaster and a taxi took us to Harrisburg. It was great fun
More creative solutions like this please! I understand dispatch doesn't always have particularly strong local knowledge about outstations but the way most airlines default to "by plane or not all" approach is very annoying. This seems to have been handled perfectly!
Smart move by Eurowings, safety first, and the ferry rebooking was a creative way to still get everyone to Santorini.
Hah, looks like Eurowings read my comment on the Condor fiasco article! /s
Good on Eurowings for taking care of their passengers and getting them to their destination ASAP, even if it wasn't on Eurowings metal.
Landing on Crete? I might wonna stay. Just kidding, obv these people had (overpriced, non-refundable) bookings on Santorinini. Super great to see an airline doing their best to get passengers to correct destination as fast as possible. Hopefully they offered same to the passengers on Santirini waiting for this plane.
Sounds like a win for the inbound pax to Santorini (hopefully the ferry crossing wasn't too choppy with that wind).
However, I"m curious about the outbound pax scheduled to depart Santorini on the turn as the crew ferried the aircraft back to base ?
Well, if the plane can't land in high crosswinds, it probably can't take off either. So for the pax stuck on Santorini, it's a run-of-the-mill weather-related cancellation. (Not that that's fun for anyone.)
TBH I'm surprised this sort of thing doesn't happen more often with Santorini. I've flown there once and the winds were pretty intense on both landing and take-off - lots of turbulence during final approach and initial ascent.
If passengers are still at the airport then it’s most likely a simple weather delay/cancellation. Still unfortunate but a lot simpler for both airlines and passengers as far as alternative options.
That was one of my thoughts, too: Okay, it's too windy to land. I know, let's put everyone on a boat in the open waters in strong winds.
Frankly, I wish more airlines were willing to think out of the box in these situations. In '02, I was on a flight that was diverted due to snowstorms, and the airline got a bus to take us the rest of the way. Sure, it meant we got in later than we'd hoped, but the alternative was not getting in at all, and we were appreciative that they'd at least done something rather than leave us stranded in the middle of nowhere.
Yesss! We've seen many terrible behaviours by airlines, dumping people into cities way too far from their planned destination and either abandoning them or making them wait for days. This solution makes me so happy! Especially as its a cheapo airline, doing the right thing and taking care of their customers. Although I am very curious what type of seats these people got on the ferry
I'm more curious whether they got put on a fast ferry (1.5 hours) or a slow ferry (4 to 6 hours). On a fast ferry, I'll take any seat!
This is where this story strikes me as being rather badly researched:
There are currently no regular ferries between Crete and Santorini. Only two high speed catamarans. One is Hellenic Seaways at 07:30 and the other one Seajets at 08:00. So if Eurowings landed in HER at 11:30 or something, there would have been no options to travel to JTR on the same day, unless they actually chartered a boat.
Does anybody have...
This is where this story strikes me as being rather badly researched:
There are currently no regular ferries between Crete and Santorini. Only two high speed catamarans. One is Hellenic Seaways at 07:30 and the other one Seajets at 08:00. So if Eurowings landed in HER at 11:30 or something, there would have been no options to travel to JTR on the same day, unless they actually chartered a boat.
Does anybody have the full rundown of this, when and how the passengers really got to Santorini after the diversion?
I travelled this route three day ago…