Mexico City airport storm and the Air France cancellations
The strike period has begun and the union has not withdrawn it, but the cancellations have not materialised. Check your own flight before you travel, and read the live check below. Last checked 2026-09-13.
An electrical storm closed Mexico City airport to traffic on 11 September 2026, diverting 43 arrivals and hitting 7,707 passengers. Air France then cancelled its Paris flight two days running, leaving passengers in the terminal for more than 24 hours. Weather removes the fixed compensation — it does not remove anything else.
Work out what you are owed →When
The storm struck on the evening of Friday 11 September 2026 and AICM suspended take-offs and landings. 48 operations were affected: 43 arrivals diverted to other airports and five departures cancelled. Air France's Paris service was then cancelled on 11 and again on 12 September, and the airport announced extra slots for the airline on the evening of Sunday 13 September.
What happened, and why the second day matters more than the first
The first cancellation is the easy one to explain: a storm closed the airport, and no airline controls the weather. The second is not. Mexican outlets reported passengers still in the terminal more than 24 hours later with no departure time, no re-routing and, by several accounts, no food — the scene was described locally as a near-riot. Profeco, the federal consumer protection agency, became involved, and the airport put on extra capacity for the airline on the Sunday. A storm on Friday night does not by itself account for a flight that was still not leaving on Sunday.
Compensation is unlikely — but care is still owed
A storm that closes an airport is the textbook extraordinary circumstance, so the fixed compensation will almost certainly fall away for the first cancellation. Everything else survives it. This flight is Mexico City to Paris on Air France — an EU carrier arriving in the EU — so EU261 reaches it, and with it the Article 9 duty of care and the Article 8 right to re-routing or a refund. Neither depends on whose fault the weather was. Twenty-four hours in a terminal with nothing provided is not a weather problem; it is a duty-of-care problem.
Airports most likely to be affected
- Mexico City (MEX)
Mexico City to Paris on Air France is an EU carrier arriving in the EU, so EU261 applies at €250, €400 or €600 where compensation is due — this route sits in the €600 band. Mexican civil aviation law applies alongside it for a departure from Mexico, and Profeco enforces that side.
What you are owed
| What you can claim | Does it survive a storm? |
|---|---|
| Compensation for the first cancellation | Unlikely — the airport was closed by weather |
| Compensation for the second cancellation | Worth pressing — see below |
| Meals and refreshments across both days | Owed, no cap |
| Hotel and transport for the nights you waited | Owed, no cap |
| Re-routing on any carrier, or a full refund | Owed — your choice, not theirs |
Four of these five survive the storm, and they are the four nobody files. If you paid for your own meals or a hotel bed because nothing was offered, those receipts are reimbursable whatever caused the delay.
What to do, in order
- Claim the money you actually spent first. Meals, a hotel, transport to it. Owed under Article 9 regardless of the cause, with no ceiling the airline gets to set. If nobody handed you a voucher and you paid, keep the receipt and claim it back — this is the part almost every stranded passenger forgets.
- Press hard on the second cancellation. Under Pešková and Peška (C-315/15) an airline relying on an extraordinary circumstance must still show it took all reasonable measures to limit the knock-on. Ask in writing what it did between Friday night and Sunday: which alternative aircraft and crews were considered, and why you were not re-routed on another carrier.
- Insist on the choice Article 8 gives you. Re-routing or a refund is your election, and re-routing means at the earliest opportunity, including on an airline other than the one that sold you the ticket. Being told to wait for the next Air France seat is not the same thing.
- Use Profeco as well as the airline. For a flight departing Mexico the federal consumer protection agency takes complaints directly, and it was already engaged with this disruption. A complaint there costs nothing and runs in parallel with your EU261 claim.
Where to send it
Claim from Air France, not from the airport and not from the weather service — the Air France guide has its own claim form and the refusals it tends to send. Run a Profeco complaint alongside it if you departed Mexico.
The rules behind this
Weather is the most common reason a claim is refused and one of the least often tested — the extraordinary-circumstances guide sets out both halves of the defence, and the duty-of-care guide covers what you are owed while you wait, whatever the cause.
Sources
This page reports what has been published elsewhere. It is not affiliated with any airline or authority, and the position can change — check your own flight status.