UK Edition
Return to Sharm: the inside story behind only UK holiday in Egypt's Red Sea resort for four years
In the summer of 2015 as many as 50 flights a week were delivering British holidaymakers into the Red Sea paradise of Sharm el-Sheikh. Drawn by year-round sun, bountiful diving opportunities and a resort purpose-built for fly-and-flop tourists, travellers arrived in their droves.
Overnight, that all stopped. Weekly arrivals fell from nearly 10,000 to zero.
On October 31 Metrojet Flight 9268 crashed shortly after take off from Sharm el-Sheikh airport. Bound for St Petersburg, the aircraft disintegrated in mid-air following the detonation of a bomb, killing all 224 onboard, its wreckage scattered across Egypt’s North Sinai.
Within a week, investigators were confident the Airbus 321 had been downed deliberately, with an explosive device smuggled on board at Sharm el-Sheikh (now believed to have been ISIS). On November 4, the UK Foreign Office changed its guidance, advising against all but essential air travel to the airport, effectively shutting the destination to Britons. On November 9, UK airlines cancelled all flights to the resort until further notice.
A plane departing British soil has not flown into Sharm since, until this week.
Within hours of the Foreign Office lifting its ban on UK flights in October this year, Red Sea Holidays announced flights on December 19. The London-based Egypt specialist will be the first UK operator to return since the autumn of 2015.
“We’re delighted,” said Andrew Grant, managing director. “Delighted for the UK, for our customers and for the hotels out there.”
Tui will return next year, in February, but until then Red Sea Holidays has exclusive access.
“It worked out really well for us,” said Grant. “[The change in travel advice] coincided with the failure of Thomas Cook so we were already speaking to airlines about covering our flights, and so we were able to source flights [to Sharm el-Sheikh] within four or five hours.”
“We’ve been quite overwhelmed by the response. The demand has always been there and we’ve known that by the number of calls we get about Sharm on a daily basis. Even though it’s been off sale for four years, it has a very loyal market and people are very keen to get back out there.”
In the wake of the crash Sharm el-Sheikh saw its visitor numbers plunge; numerous photo reports from the Red Sea showed a resort lying empty, with eerie streets and deserted beaches. Arrivals to Egypt as a whole fell to 5.26m in 2016, down from 14m in 2010.
Since, however, a number of European countries have lifted their restrictions, allowing holidaymakers to return and reawakening the city. Indeed, the UK was one of the last to change its stance.
“Nothing much has changed out there,” said Grant. “It’s just as good as it always was. We’ve got a good resort team out there, and in terms of what the holidaymakers can expect it’s really no different.”
When German and French tourists returned to Sharm el-Sheikh, the UK Government came under criticism for delaying the change, with many believing the resort has been safe for years. Stephen Timms, co-chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Egypt, said earlier this year there was no remaining justification for the ban. “It’s done great damage to the Egyptian economy. It’s done damage to Britain’s standing in Egypt,” he said.
Lifting the ban in October, the Foreign Office said improvements in security procedures and close cooperation between the UK and Egypt on aviation security allowed a change in guidance. It still warns that terrorists “are very likely to try to carry out attacks” and warns against travel to any other part of the Sinai peninsula.
“I think you can expect to see a much more visible security presence at the airport,” said Grant. “Anyone who has been to Hurghada [another Red Sea destination] will have seen the heightened security - almost too much - but it’s in place for a reason.”
He said hoteliers in Sharm el-Sheikh are ecstatic to have the British return: “They’re over the moon. They’ve given us some fantastic offers. It’s a great time to book.”
Red Sea Holidays has chartered planes with Enter Air and will depart for Egypt on Thursday morning from Birmingham, and from London Gatwick on Sunday.
“It will be around 6am at Birmingham on Thursday so not sure how much of a celebration there will be then, but certainly once they get out into resort, we’ll try to make a fuss about it,” he said.
Grant said it may take longer than one summer to return to the weekly flight schedule running in 2014, but he is already looking to put on extra capacity due to demand. “Tui will arrive in February,” he said, “but until that point everything is ours, and we’re really taking advantage of that.”
Inspiration for your inbox
Sign up to Telegraph Travel's new weekly newsletter for the latest features, advice, competitions, exclusive deals and comment.