I know easyJet have attracted a bit of bad press on here but they have done their best considering the circumstances. As has already been pointed out there is only a finite number of standby crew and even that pool was probably getting depleted to some extent due to the long days and the extra duty hours that crew were accumulating. These extra hours then would limit what use some crew could be if they are running close to their limits for their duty hours etc.
To be fair to easyJet, they have positioned the odd aircraft up to Manchester over the past week or so from Stansted or Luton to try and ease the disruption.
The current staff shortage/industrial issues with ATC staff in the Canaries has produced some 'eye watering' slot delays as well and that has just compounded the disruption over the past week or so. Slot delays to and from the Canaries were in the worst case topping 5 hours last weekend for some flights. One of the easyJet TFS rotations night-stopped in TFS due to the crew running out of hours. I think there was a LPL-ACE rotation that was in the same boat as well due to horrendous slot delays. Very unfortunate timing when some of the passengers that were travelling, were perhaps rebooked from previous flights that were cancelled due to the snow.
Finally... no I do not work for them before anyone asks!
