Ryanair will not pay compensation for cancelled flights

Thousands of passengers who had their travel plans thrown into chaos by flight cancellations at Stansted will not receive compensation. Ryanair grounded more than 150 flights Tuesday citing thunderstorms. 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 EU regulations if a flight is delayed by more than 3 hours passengers are entitled to a refund or alternative travel arrangements being made. The carrier said service had returned to normal Wednesday after 6 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. <br/>