The Brits trying to escape besieged Dubai: Holidaymakers tell of widespread panic engulfing UAE airports – with their only option to make eight hour journey to Oman

Terrified Britons trying to escape under-fire Dubai told today of the widespread panic now engulfing airports.

With some 14,000 UK citizens alone having flagged to the authorities that they want to get out of the desert city and other sites across the Middle East, there is now a palpable sense of desperation.

Iran is believed to have fired almost as many drones and missiles at Dubai and the United Arab Emirates, the gulf’s dominant trade and tourism hub, as it has at Israel, with even the iconic Palm Jumeirah hotel in flames.

The Daily Mail spoke today to some of the thousands of stranded tourists and expats trying to escape the warzone that now is Dubai on flights back to Britain.

Among them was Paul Hart who told how he and his wife had been stuck in Dubai since the fighting started – and could not travel to Oman for the British Government‘s repatriation flight.

He said: ‘If you travel to Oman you have to go to the border and then get another taxi to take you from the border to, the airport.

‘My wife suffers from Crohn’s disease and also has occipital neuralgia, therefore she needs close proximity to toilets and things, so it’s not an option to travel to Oman.

‘My plane was due to depart on February 28. I was actually on board. It was all boarded, and then it came over the airways that ‘Sorry, the airspace is closed’.

‘So after four hours, we were able to depart the plane. Fortunately, we were able to get a taxi, and fortunately, we ere able to return to our original hotel, because the alternative they provided was booked up within seconds.

‘I’ve been in this hotel, I’ve rebooked for four days, and I’ve rebooked for another five days, and I’m fully expecting when my flight, which is due to leave on Monday, it will be cancelled on Saturday, and we will go around the around the loop again, with the prospect of another flight, but BA has got no intention flying people out of Dubai.’

Among them was retiree Sue King, 66, from Newquay, Cornwall, who had been staying with her daughter and family in Dubai when the first wave of missiles and drones from Iran struck.

‘It was very frightening,’ she recalled. ‘We heard the bangs and saw some flashes from interceptions, but luckily my grandchildren are very young, so they didn’t pick up on what was going on.

‘I was originally supposed to fly home on Sunday, but that was never going to happen [after the war began on Saturday].

‘Then I thought that there was a British Airways repatriation flight going from Dubai Airport this morning, so I came down here on the off-chance, but it was cancelled anyway.

‘I’m now on standby for two different Emirates flights to Heathrow, one at 2pm and another at 2am, so I’m just crossing my fingers that I can get on one of them.’

In fact, despite Dubai airport’s live departures board showing Ms King’s ‘cancelled’ British Airways flight, it was never even scheduled, according to a BA spokesman, who said: ‘We aren’t operating from Dubai at the moment’.

Meanwhile an SAS Gulf war veteran is airlifting terrified British holidaymakers out of Dubai at £2,500 a time.

Des Steel, 64, runs an international security company and flies his operatives in and out of the Middle East every day.

Manchester-based Mr Steel is now using his covert ‘fixers’ contacts and drivers to get Brits out of Dubai and safely home.

He has already repatriated 35 people and the last to go, a family of three, paid £2,500 each.

Mr Steel picks up stranded Brits at their hotels and drives them to the borders of Oman or Saudi where they are met by local drivers.

They are then driven to the country’s international airport where tickets have been bought by his fixer.

Mr Steel said: ‘If it was me, I’d pour myself a Pina Colada go out onto my hotel balcony and wait for it to blow over which it will.

‘But I understand that people are worried and when rockets are going off around you, you want to get home.

‘I realised I could help by employing the same network I use every day for my security agents.’

Mr Steel says his escape route is very safe and the chances of one of his vehicles being hit by a rogue drone are a million to one.

The cost of each ‘ticket’ home is variable. The biggest expense is for the drivers with some charging more than $1,000 to get a car load of passengers to airports.

Brits taking up his offer pay the standard air fare home with Mr Steel and his fixers taking a cut of the overall price, which works out tens for thousands of pounds cheaper than some holidaymakers have paid to get home.

The barrage of deadly drone fire has become an unavoidable daily – and nightly – reality for those in Dubai, even those influencers desperately keen to avoid being seen to publicly make any negative comments.

Wailing sirens warning of missile alerts have been blaring out across the metropolis at all hours for six successive days – as the UEA became the worst-hit of the ten Gulf states so far targeted by Israel

Several British passengers disembarked from one of the stranded cruise ships at Dubai’s Port Rashid, the MSC Euribia.

A fleet of buses waited to transfer them overland on a 12-hour journey to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for connecting flights to Europe.

Screen printer Mark Killgariff, 54, from Stoke-on-Trent, told the Mail: ‘The first night was a bit hairy.

‘We could see things in the distance, and the next day there were about six explosions, which was a little scary, but we soon realised that the missiles and drones were being intercepted.

‘Family and friends have been emailing and texting, but we’ve reassured them.’

And he hopes they have worked out a way to get home, saying: ‘We’ll now fly to Rome with Emirates and we’ll have to try and find our way back to Manchester form there. We should have been going home tomorrow by a different flight, of course. But we have been well looked after.’

At least one ballistic missile and over 100 suicide drones have been launched at the city.

And tourists who had come for luxurious holidays are now finding their phones ringing out to remind them that they are now in a warzone.

The attacks had forced Dubai airport to close, leaving 20,000 travellers stuck in the UAE and all flights suspended.

Airports across the region were initially closed after Iranian missile and drone attacks, but have now begun to reopen with heavily restricted air traffic.

And even though the airport in Dubai has now reopened, it’s struggling to cope with the knock-on effects as about half a million passengers a day ordinarily travel through it and sister airports in Doha or Abu Dhabi, which are all vital hubs between Europe and Asia.

Many permanent residents continue to put a brave face on things – while trying to get out.

Dubai residents Eoin Campbell, 32, and Kate O’Neill, originally from Northern Ireland, said they were travelling back on a scheduled break to see their families.

Although they had three cancelled flights so far, they were now trying to get to Edinburgh, from where they would continue with a short hop home.

‘I don’t feel unsafe,’ said construction manager Mr Campbell. ‘You can see that the air defence capability is up to scratch from the small numbers getting through, so the chances are very small of being injured.

‘We’ll come back here without any qualms.’

Also being brave were an older couple from Ireland – despite having been staying at the Palm Jumeirah when it went up in flames.

Pat O’Reilly, 81, and his wife Bernadette,76, from Ardfield, near Clonakilty in County Cork, were staying in the Fairmont Hotel on the Palm Jumeirah, when it received a direct hit on Saturday night, but luckily were visiting their son and his family when the fire started.

‘We weren’t that far away, and we heard the bang,’ said former insurance agent Mr O’Reilly. ‘Then the phones all sounded with the emergency alert and we realised what had happened. Our 11-year-old granddaughter was frightened out of her life.’

But the couple have shown remarkable calm.

‘We phoned the hotel and they said they’d evacuated everyone,’ Mr O’Reilly said, ‘so we stayed at our son’s for longer and returned a bit later when the fire was out.’

The couple were not sure that they would be able to find a flight to Dublin today, so left their luggage at their son’s house, and it will be sent on later.

‘We’ve had a relaxed few days, as we booked today’s flight on Sunday morning.

They shrugged off the drama of their extended stay, except for one disappointment, explained Mrs O’Reilly.

‘Our local pub the Mountain House in Ardfield has been closed for two years and their grand reopening is tonight and we’re going to miss it.’

Mr O’Reilly added: ‘The war? No problem. Missing the opening of the pub, that’s bad.’