In One Day, 22 'Flights to Nowhere'

Passengers on Emirates flight EK10 thought they were bound for Dubai; they instead logged an 11.5-hour loop that ended back in London where they started. The jet was one of roughly 30 Emirates flights forced to turn around or divert on Monday after Iranian drone strikes temporarily shut Dubai International Airport, typically the world's busiest for international traffic, per Reuters. A total of 65 flights were diverted, with 22 of those returning to their starting points as so-called "flights to nowhere," per Business Insider. Emirates flight EK76 from Paris did a U-turn over the Saudi desert, returning to the French capital after nearly 11 hours in the air. Another Emirates flight, EK164, departed Dublin late Sunday, only to arrive back in the Irish capital around 7am Monday after a U-turn over Egypt.

The aviation disruptions are a visible, global side effect of the Iran war that erupted Feb. 28. Large swaths of Gulf airspace briefly went quiet, then slowly refilled as the region's airlines restored routes, only to face fresh drone and missile alerts and a brief UAE airspace closure on Tuesday. Some long-haul flights were rerouted to countries including Italy, Egypt, and Pakistan, while an Emirates service from Shanghai reached Dubai only after a 20-hour, 7,000-mile odyssey via Bangladesh. Data firm Cirium says Emirates has canceled more than half its scheduled flights since Feb. 28; across the region, about 30,000 flights have been scrapped. Ticket prices are soaring as a result, per Euronews.