THOUSANDS of passengers who had their travel plans thrown into chaos by flight cancellations at Stansted Airport will not receive compensation reports the BBC.

Ryanair grounded more than 150 flights on Tuesday citing thunderstorms.

Holidaymakers and other passengers have been left to count the cost as the airline has said it will not be paying out for the disruption.

Ryanair said this was because the cancellations were due to “extraordinary circumstances”.

Under European Union regulations if a flight is delayed by more than three hours passengers are entitled to a refund or alternative travel arrangements being made.

The carrier said service had returned to normal on Wednesday after six days of issues, but several flights were still delayed.

Ryanair said air traffic controller shortages in countries such as Croatia, France and Germany had also contributed to the problems.

Ryanair has said the thunderstorms on Tuesday morning created “extraordinary circumstances”

A Ryanair spokesman said: “Customers affected by flights disrupted due to the adverse weather in recent days were notified by email and SMS text message and advised of their options of a refund or free move to the next available flight.

“Ryanair fully complies with all EU261 legislation, however as these flight cancellations were caused by extraordinary circumstances (weather), no EU261 compensation is due.”