PARIS — Governments across the world rushed to organize the return of their citizens from the Middle East on Wednesday and air traffic seemed to be picking up slightly as travel across the region remained heavily disrupted by the widening Iran war.
A plane carrying French citizens from Oman and then Egypt landed in Paris early Wednesday, the first of several expected repatriation flights organized by France's government. A group of students also returned to Italy after their government evacuated them from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
While repatriation efforts gained momentum, air travel across the Middle East remained deeply disrupted. Airspace closures and restrictions across much of the Gulf have stranded passengers not only in the region but also in cities far from the conflict after connecting flights through major airline hubs were canceled.
More than 20,000 of the more than 36,000 flights scheduled to fly to or from the Middle East between the start of the war and Wednesday have been canceled, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium. Flight-tracking service FlightAware reported about 2,000 flight cancellations worldwide on Wednesday, down from about 3,150 on Monday.
Oman, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan have emerged as key transit points for repatriation flights evacuating foreign citizens.
Helping the most vulnerable
France estimates about 400,000 of its citizens are in parts of the Mideast affected by the conflict, either as residents or travelers, President Emmanuel Macron said.
Eleonore Caroit, the minister responsible for French nationals abroad, said about 100 seats on the country's first evacuation flight were reserved for vulnerable passengers, including families with children, older people and those with medical conditions.
Two more flights were expected later Wednesday — a military aircraft carrying 180 French citizens from Abu Dhabi and a charter bringing 205 people from Israel.
“Our goal is to help repatriate as quickly as possible the French people who wish to return,” Caroit told French broadcaster TF1.
Other governments were also organizing evacuation efforts.
The U.S. State Department vowed in an X post on Wednesday to help evacuate Amercians. Earlier in the week, the department told U.S. citizens to leave more than a dozen countries using any available commercial transportation options.
“Any American in the Middle East who wishes to leave: call the State Department and we will get your home," the post said, adding that 18,000 Americans had so far safely returned to the U.S., including 8,500 on Tuesday.
Britain said a charter flight would depart Oman late Wednesday to bring back some of the thousands of U.K. nationals in the Gulf.
The U.K. Foreign Office said more than 130,000 British nationals in the Middle East had registered their presence with the government since the conflict began Saturday, though officials said not all are trying to leave. Many are in the UAE, and the government has advised against trying to travel overland to Oman.
Ireland’s foreign minister said Emirates airline would operate a flight from Dubai to Dublin on Wednesday. Foreign Affairs Minister Helen McEntee said an estimated 22,000 to 23,000 Irish citizens were in the Middle East. The Irish government said it also planned to charter a flight for about 280 people from Oman in the coming days.
Elsewhere, Norway’s Foreign Ministry said it was sending an “emergency team” to Dubai to reinforce a Norwegian Embassy team that was helping an estimated 1,500 Norwegians registered in the city.
Scrambling for plane tickets
Italian student Valerio Schiavoi, who was participating in a United Nations diplomatic simulation in Dubai through the World Students Connection Program, said the atmosphere changed abruptly when news of the U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on Iran broke Saturday.
“As soon as we leave the room, we start to hear the sounds of military planes and so on. And the panic starts a bit," Schiavoi told Italian news agency LaPresse. "Through the window we could see missiles passing by and alarms kept sounding, but we didn’t know what to do.”
Commercial airlines have resumed limited flights, with Etihad, Emirates and Virgin Atlantic due to operate flights from the UAE to London on Wednesday. But scores of travelers struggled to find a way home.
British Airways said Wednesday that its flights scheduled to leave Thursday through Saturday from Muscat were fully booked.
“We fully understand this is a very difficult time for our customers,” the airline said, saying it would add additional flights “if we are able to.”
Li Qian, a 44-year-old tourist from Hangzhou, China, has been stuck in Abu Dhabi with her family after airspace closures disrupted their return flight. She said she received repeated missile alerts on her mobile phone and saw smoke rising near areas they had visited.
“It was frightening ... We just want to get home as soon as possible,” she said, adding that she worried about her mother’s high blood pressure medication and her child’s return to school.
Thousands of miles away in the Indonesian resort island Bali, about 6,000 people were stranded because their flights to Doha, Dubai and Abu Dhabi were canceled, officials said. Many of those affected were tourists from Europe or the U.S. trying to fly long-haul via those Middle Eastern airports.
Indonesian immigration authorities issued emergency stay permits and waived overstay fines for stranded foreign nationals.
Agnes Chen Pun, a Hong Kong expatriate who moved with her family to Dubai last year, said she struggled to find plane tickets to leave the region. She moved first to a resort in Fujairah, then to a desert resort near Sharjah amid fears of potential attacks and local fires.
“We were so nervous, so anxious,” said Chen, a partner at Asia Bankers Club, a Hong Kong- and Dubai-based investment company.
She said she considered booking a 13-seat private jet costing $268,000 but ultimately secured commercial tickets to Singapore for around $2,200 per person. Despite the disruption, Chen said she planned to return to the UAE once the situation stabilizes.
“I think the scare, the fears, will be short-term,” she said.
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Associated Press journalists Sylvia Hui, Brian Melley and Bridget Virgo in London, and Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed to this story.
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