Passengers were left 'gobsmacked' when their flight to Alicante took off without them. The Manchester flight departed, leaving dozens of passengers stranded in a stairwell this morning (January 19).

The holidaymakers had presented their passports to the airline's staff and had their boarding passes scanned, but found themselves waiting in the stairwell for up to 40 minutes with no explanation. They believed they were waiting for a member of staff to open the doors leading to the stairs up to the plane, or onto a bus that would transport them to the aircraft. However, the plane took off without them. The group of at least 35 passengers have reportedly been informed that there was an 'error on the stairwell directions'. Jet2has apologised to the customers and stated that they are treating the incident as a 'matter of urgency'. Matt, from Denton, who was scheduled to travel on the LS879 flight to Alicante at 7am, expressed his shock over the incident and claimed that Jet2staff had told him that such an event had 'never happened before'.

Matt told the Manchester Evening News how he and his son arrived punctually at the airport, cleared security without issue, and reached the gate in good time when boarding was announced. Following the initial boarding call for the front section of the aircraft, Matt's row number was then called.

He explained: "So we've all come to the terminal and everybody's gone through from 26 to 40, then they called the rest of us. We've all gone through to the gate and boarded.

"But instead of carrying on onto the plane, there were some stairs so the herd mentality is that we all went down the stairs and followed each other. There was a lot of us.

"And then we're thinking 'why aren't these doors open'. We thought a bus would come for us and take us to the plane. We were there for 10 minutes, 20, 30, then we thought 'what's going on'. We were literally stuck like caged animals."

Matt described how an airport employee eventually approached from the tarmac to enquire about the situation. The staff member then allegedly informed the stranded passengers 'the plane's gone'.

Matt claimed he was informed that crew members don't conduct headcounts once boarding has commenced. "I am gobsmacked at the fact they don't do a headcount. That plane is at least 36 people light, it's bizarre. You'd think the captain would ask if they had a full flight."

Matt revealed that he and fellow travellers had been handed a £10 voucher from Jet2 whilst they awaited news of their rescheduled flight to Alicante. "There's lots of elderly here as well", he noted.

"I've got my son here who suffers from anxiety and I've brought him to take him away. It's like an episode of Fawlty Towers, you've never seen anything like it.

"They're saying now that there should have been the red rope to divert you onto the plane but that wasn't, so everyone just went down. It's unfathomable. I don't even think this has ever happened before."

A Jet2 spokesperson responded with a statement: "We are aware that flight LS879 from Manchester to Alicante departed without some customers this morning, and we are investigating this as a matter of urgency with the airport.

"Our team are looking after these customers, and we have already arranged for them to take other flights to Alicante today. We would of course like to apologise to these customers."