Sunday Times apologises and pays damages to Ryanair

Sunday Times apologises and pays damages to Ryanair

The Sunday Times has paid out "substantial damages" and apologised to Ryanair for an article published in September last year in which it alleged that the airline had broken safety rules on 1,201 occasions.

Yesterday's paper carried a lengthy apology on page 2 of its travel section (rather than in the main section), as shown here.

It stated that the September story, headlined "Ryanair accused of 1,201 safety violations", claimed to have been based on a leaked report from the Spanish air safety agency (AESA).

This was alleged to have said that Ryanair planes broke safety rules 1,201 times in Spanish airspace in the first six months of 2012.

But the paper said: "We now accept that this was incorrect; there was no such report and Ryanair did not commit 1,201 breaches of safety rules." It continued:


The Sunday Times said the damages payable to Ryanair will, at the company's request, be paid to an Irish-based charity, The Jack & Jill Children's Foundation.

No foundation but rubbish sells papers... haha any profits made are now paid back and more.

The full apology printed in the Sunday Times can be read below:
An article (headlined “Ryanair accused of 1,201 safety violations”, Travel, September 23, 2012) stated that, according to a leaked report from the Spanish air safety agency (AESA), Ryanair planes broke safety rules 1,201 times in Spanish airspace in the first six months of 2012. We now accept that this was incorrect; there was no such report and Ryanair did not commit 1,201 breaches of safety rules.

In the same article we also reported three emergency landings which arose due to bad weather diversions from Madrid to Valencia on July 26, 2012. The article described these flights as having insufficient fuel to remain in holding patterns and reported claims that Ryanair was routinely abusing the mayday protocol to jump landing queues. We accept that all these allegations were untrue and apologise to Ryanair for the damage caused by this article. We have agreed to pay Ryanair substantial damages, which at the company’s request will be paid to the charity The Jack & Jill Children’s Foundation.

Finally, we reported in our article “Most Ryanair pilots are freelance” (News, ¬September 30, 2012) union claims that pilots feel under pressure to fly when ill and pilots’ claims that they are rostered for fewer flights if they fall into the bottom 20% of Ryanair’s monthly fuel league tables. We now accept Ryanair’s statements that pilots are not put under any such pressure and that the fuel-burn league tables are designed to improve fuel performance, which makes flights safer.

We also accept the Irish Aviation Authority’s assurance that Ryanair’s safety is “on a par with the safest airlines in Europe”.