An athlete flying from Edinburgh Airport was finally reunited with his £9,000 bike after Ryanair lost it twice - in two different countries.

Team GB athlete Tom Kennedy was flying to France to compete in an ironman triathlon last weekend but his hope of qualifying were left up in the air without his specialist equipment.

The 31-year-old, from Stirling, had flown to Nantes to take part in the gruelling competition and was left furious when he realised the airline failed to board his bike, wetsuit and helmet onto the plane from Edinburgh.

As the Record previously reported, Tom encountered the same issue in Dublin two days later. Tom's mum Sally was informed by Ryanair that it could take seven days to locate the items, but thankfully he was reunited in time for the 70.3km swim, run and
cycle race.

Retired headteacher Sally claims that after numerous phone calls, Ryanair said they would fly the bike to Dublin and transfer it to Nantes on time for the race which didn't happen.

The 60-year-old said: "Nothing about this was straightforward. After being told the earliest they could get it here was next week, we then received a call to say it was being flown to Dublin and then onto Nantes on Saturday morning.

"But Tom's Airtag showed it hadn't moved from Dublin after the flight had taken off and they confirmed it had once again not been transferred onto the plane.

"We couldn't believe it as we had actually started to believe it was coming. Thankfully after further calls they agreed to send it back to London and board it onto a later flight.

Tom was reunited with his bike just hours before the race was due to begin.

Sally added: "He finally got it back on Saturday evening, just in time for it to be registered for the race on Sunday. They actually gave him an extension because of the circumstances.

"Tom performed brilliantly in the race. He achieved a personal best of four hours, 47 mins, 10 seconds. This is eight minutes less than his previous best. How phenomenal given the lack of training the last two days. What an athlete."

https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/edinburgh-news/edinburgh-airport-passenger-athlete-reunited-27257705

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)