Anxious travellers scramble as Iran war strands tens of thousands across the Middle East

Frustrated and anxious travellers clamoured Tuesday for ways out of the Middle East and beyond as the widening Iran war constrained commercial flights through the region for a fourth day, stranding tens of thousands of people.

The conflict that started Saturday when the US and Israel attacked Iran grounded airline passengers in major Mideast cities as well as ones awaiting connecting flights in countries far from the threat of airstrikes.

With national airspaces closed or tightly restricted across much of the Gulf, many were unsure what to do and appealed to their governments for information and exit strategies.

“They say ‘Get out,’ but how do you expect us to get out when airspaces are closed?” said Odies Turner, a 32-year-old chef from Dallas who was stuck in Doha, Qatar.

“They just have been cancelling every flight. I want to go home.”

The US State Department told American citizens to leave more than a dozen countries in the region right away using any available commercial transportation.

The countries included Iran and Israel, as well as Qatar, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, the Palestinian territories, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

But commercial options remained limited.

About 18,000 flights, or nearly 55% of all scheduled flight arrivals and departures in the Middle East, have been cancelled since Saturday, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium.

The number included 3,800 cancellations on Tuesday.

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