About 15,500 passengers were left stranded and they have now been re-booked. Qantas spokeswoman Olivia Worth says the airline is putting on five extra flights with about 4,000 seats to fly passengers between Australia and Europe. She says that should clear the backlog.

"In the next 24 to 48 hours, we expect that any passenger who was delayed in Australia or Asia - that includes Singapore, Hong Kong and Bangkok and also many of the passengers in London - [will be on a plane]," she said. She says some people have changed the times of their holidays and destinations and so they will not need to fly immediately.