Delayed or cancelled flight from Lanzarote

Visibility is the weather that matters here. Lanzarote has no low-visibility procedures: under the rules ENAIRE publishes for the airport, the tower stops clearing flights when visibility drops below 800 metres and restarts only once it is back above 900 metres and improving. Saharan dust (calima) and low cloud are what bring it down. On 19 August 2024, with AEMET dust warnings in force, thick haze led to 12 diversions, most of them to Fuerteventura, and on 16 November 2025 drizzle from low cloud diverted seven flights, according to Aena as reported by RTVC. The worst case was the calima of 22 and 23 February 2020, when Aena said 360 flights were affected across the eight Canary airports. Weather like this can count as an extraordinary circumstance, so compensation may not be due, but the airline must still look after you, and a plane that lands elsewhere delays the flight home it was due to operate.

Strikes are the other cause. Spain's Ministry of Transport set minimum services, with Lanzarote among the airports covered, for the strike at Azul Handling, which handles Ryanair group flights, that began on 1 October 2025, and for Groundforce's stoppages on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 27 March 2026. The Commission says strikes by air traffic controllers or airport staff may be extraordinary, and that a strike by the airline's own staff is not; handling companies working for an airline are not addressed directly, so make the claim and let the airline prove its case.

What does pay: a strike by the airline's own pilots or cabin crew, which the EU Court of Justice ruled in 2021 is not extraordinary, and ordinary technical faults. An airline can blame bad weather that hit the same aircraft earlier in the day only if it shows a direct link to your delay.

The airline owes you care at Lanzarote whatever caused the delay. Ask at the gate or at your airline's information desk: Aena lists desks run by the handling companies Aviapartner, Azul Handling (for Ryanair) and Groundforce on Floor 1 of Terminal 1, and Atlántica Handling (for Binter) on Floor 0. The airport's published operating hours end at 01:00 local time, so a flight held late into the evening can be moved to the next morning, and then the airline owes you a hotel and transport to it. Airside, La Isla Gourmet on Floor 1 opens 06:00 to 22:00 and the open-air terraces are a better place to wait than the gate, but flights are not announced, so keep an eye on the screens. If the airline gives you nothing, buy what is reasonable and claim it back with the receipts.

Claiming yourself costs nothing. Send the claim to the airline that operated the flight, using its own claim form, with your booking reference and the times you actually arrived. If it refuses, or has not answered after a month, complain to AESA, Spain's aviation safety agency, which is also the official dispute body for air passengers: for flights from 2 June 2023 its decision binds the airline, and you must file within one year of your claim to the airline. Spanish law's general limit for personal claims is 5 years.

Flying home to the UK on a UK or EU airline, your flight is also covered by the UK rules, and if you go to court in England, Wales or Northern Ireland the limit is 6 years (5 in Scotland). You can be paid only once for the same disruption, so claim under the EU rules that apply to a flight from Spain.

Or hand it to AirHelp, which works on a no win, no fee basis: if it wins, it keeps 35% of the compensation including VAT, plus a further 15% if it has to go to court; if it does not win, you pay nothing. Keep your booking reference and boarding pass, screenshots of the delay or cancellation messages, the reason the airline gave you, and receipts for anything you bought while you waited.

New EU rules, Regulation (EU) 2026/2202, apply from 23 October 2027; for any flight before then, today's rules on this page apply.