Storm Boelo cancels 90 departures at Amsterdam Schiphol as winds sweep Europe

Dozens of flights cancelled at Schiphol

Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, one of the main European hubs, cancelled dozens of flights on Sunday, 25 October, because strong winds linked to storm Boelo swept across the region. AFP counted 90 cancelled flights on the airport's departures page, most of them bound for European cities including Paris, Rome and Dublin. Dozens more flights due to land at Schiphol were also cancelled or delayed, so the disruption reached both travellers leaving and arriving at the hub. The airport attributed the reduced schedule to the strong winds and said that fewer flights would take off and land that day. It did not give the exact number of services affected, and it had not responded immediately to AFP's request for further information.

Storms Boelo and Austen hit northwest France

Storms Boelo and Austen were the first of the season in France, and they struck the northwest of the country during the night from Thursday to Friday, 22 to 23 October. A 62-year-old man died, and two people were taken to hospital. Météo-France said the storm Austen was heading toward the Benelux countries and Germany after its passage over France. The sources name no other deaths or injuries in France, and they do not describe the damage on the ground in detail.

Orange wind alert lifted on Friday evening

On Friday, 23 October, at 20:00, Météo-France lifted the orange wind alert for all affected departments. Those departments include the Hauts-de-France region and the coast from Côtes-d'Armor to Seine-Maritime, according to the agency's most recent bulletin. The alert was lifted two days before the Sunday cancellations at Schiphol. Nothing in the sources says whether the alert was lifted because the wind had eased. The timeline below sets out the sequence of storm, alert and airport events as the sources describe them.

What remains unclear

The airport has not stated a total number of cancelled or delayed flights, so the 90 cancellations are an AFP count from one page on Sunday rather than a final tally. The sources do not say how long the disruption lasted or whether flights were still affected after Sunday. The French casualty figures are the single death and two hospitalisations reported so far, and the sources do not give the full wording of the airport's statement.