What do we want . Answers it is a travesty, it has devastated our lives because of Thomas Cook Airlines uk. The captain turned around to me and said it was gone. I went into the flight deck and cried. It has not been possible to save one of the most loved brands in travel. After 178 years it was all over. As i got to the airport, i started to cry because i thought, im coming here in a uniform and ive got nowhere to go. You cant just leave brits stranded abroad. I want to go home bankruptcy, bitterness and rage. I think it has been a National Scandal to let a company of that size and heritage just fall like that. They took millions of british tourists abroad every year. The biggest brand offering winter or summer sunshine. Thomas cook was the uks oldest travel business, also the best known travel brand on the high street as well. It had a huge amount of love and respect from customers and employees. It changed how people travel. Two weeks in greece, late july. Lets see they created a new concept. The package holiday. Dontjust book it, thomas cook it. Trips to places like spain became the new norm as tourism boomed. And as our travel addiction took off, thomas cook grew and grew. Exotic, enticing destinations were affordable for millions. But what the glitzy marketing did not show was that thomas cook was in debt. We know we have been in the news a lot recently. The message injuly all will be fine. Keep booking with thomas cook, your holiday is in safe hands. They were wrong. We just want to bring some breaking news now on thomas cook, we have just heard in the last few minutes that thomas cook has ceased trading. Thomas cook, one of the worlds biggest tour operators, has collapsed after last ditch talks to save the business failed. Britains oldest travel group, thomas cook, collapses. The fleet of planes was grounded in the early hours of this morning, wrecking Holiday Plans of so many people. As its planes landed back in britain one last time, they were seized and impounded at uk airports. That name, a giant of uk travel, was bankrupt. It had taken people on organised trips for a century and a half, but the age of the thomas cook holiday was done. We suspected it would never happen, then it did. It was a very sad day, and the repercussions are continuing to spin out now. Check in at uk airports normally bustling on a monday morning, suddenly a sorry sight. People felt the impact of the companys collapse straightaway. I was told to come here now to find out that my flight has been cancelled with three kids. My son has adhd and autism. They are sobbing their hearts out in the car. I got in touch with them yesterday and they said everything had gone through and there was nothing to worry about. I got in touch with them and they said under no circumstances the holiday would be cancelled. And we would be put on another plane regardless of whether they went into liquidation or not. We got set off at 3am this morning, and we were given a duty of care number, and they said there were no planes available. I was reporting at Gatwick Airport when the news broke. Look at this. Yesterday, check in here would have been very busy but with the company collapsing overnight, its airlines effectively vanished. There was inevitable chaos, and youd think that on a story that big that everyone had seen the news but people were still pitching up to the airport hoping that they could get on their holiday. We are gutted, disappointed. It meant a lot to us. It is our first holiday away together. Im still angry. We met stephan and zoe, supposed to fly to the canaries to scatter her dads ashes. With them, their young children. They are devastated, theyd been looking forward to this for months and months. We didntjust decide to go, weve planned this. We had to get paperwork for the ashes. We had to do everything. Martin and gemma were planning their wedding on a greek island but they booked it all with thomas cook. It broke my heart. I couldnt believe it. Gutted. Didnt want it to be true. We are a bit confused and empty. We dont really know what to do. All of that planning and its all gone. The big challenge for the authorities was at airports abroad. When the company folded there were 150,000 people already on thomas cook holidays in places like majorca. Now, it was down to the uk government to get every single one of them home. We knew the scale of what we had to undertake. Nothing like this had ever been done before. There has never been a peacetime repatriation as big. We were pretty nervous and absolutely keyed up to do it. But yeah, biting our fingernails at the same time. The operation was codenamed matterhorn, the Civil Aviation authority had been planning it for weeks. We really, really hoped there was going to be a commercial solution for thomas cook, because this was not an operation we ever wanted to undertake. Thomas cook, the worlds oldest travel company. Its employees and customers, its really sad. I think actually almost up to two days beforehand, we thought there was the possibility of a commercial solution but of course, you have to prepare for scenarios that are very different. But even before the operation to bring people home had begun, hotels were, for a while, refusing to let customers leave. As my colleague gavin lee witnessed first hand in majorca. This is the main thomas cook run hotel in palma, and we are told by staff everything is ok but management will not speak to us. Theyve got security here for the first time. They are quite nervous. Its one of a number of hotels we understand are waiting to be paid in arrears from thomas cook and meantime, they are still having to look after customers too. Reception dont know what is happening. They said yes, the hotel is open at the moment. We feel like at any moment we are vulnerable and could be asked to leave. Thomas cook customers had paid for their holidays, but many hotels which were owed money by the company were initially unaware that they had been refunded by the uks atol travel Insurance Scheme and some were demanding people pay for a second time. We went out for dinner last night and came back to the hotel and we couldnt get into our room. We went downstairs to the lobby and the lady said basically give us 340 euros and you can get back into your room. So that is what we had to do. It was up to the uks Civil Aviation authority to reassure hotels that they would be paid. We spoke in the first three days to 3,500 hotels, individually, and some of them were reasonably quite cross. 0ne hotel in mexico was owed over 1 million. So, they were not happy. We said the atol protected customers would be paid for and that would allow people to continue the holidays. To understand the scale of the companys demise, it helps to consider its rise which began right back in the 1800s. One of its shops can even be spotted on the corner of st marks square in venice in 1898. The firm then enjoyed a century of growth and success, a winner in the modern age. But in 2007 it merged with mytravel, to create a much bigger group. That is when its debt grew, and other factors like competition from Online Travel agents, or 0tas, pushed it over the edge. Various factors. Importa ntly, competition had increased massively in the last decade, likejet2 holidays, and 0tas took millions of customers away from tour operators. It had been a challenging market. Brexit uncertainty and a weak pound, ultimately their problems came back to this huge debt they were saddled with from a previous business merger which meant the business was not able to be truly profitable because it had to put so much of its profits back into servicing the debt. In the wake of thomas cooks downfall, the immediate priority was to get the tens of thousands of tourists back to britain. Hey, the manchester flight is full, right . The compa nys staff, who had lost theirjobs, helped out. 0ur rep was really good, he came to that hotel two or three times today to make sure we could get home and make sure we knew what was going on. With confusion inevitable, the first day at airports like palma, was the hardest. Watching the matterhorn repatriations effort at first was chaotic. It didnt go well at all. There were hundreds of airport passengers coming, they were anxious, they took cabs, they did not know if the coaches would turn up. They were told by thomas cook staff and by the Civil Aviation authority to stay in one corner of the departure lounge and that built up and built up. There were some people there for 18 or 19 hours, sat on the floor, some crying, working out how they would get home. By day two, it was completely different. The big airlines came in to help and it was really smooth from there. The Civil Aviation authority had experience to draw on, when Monarch Airlines collapsed two years ago. Then, it had to repatriate more than 100,000 people but operation matterhorn, which cost the uk government £40 million, was significantly bigger. At the beginning of the second week, i was allowed on an airbus a380 which was tasked with bringing hundreds of people home. This airbus a380 is about to head to sunny majorca to bring around 400 thomas cook customers back here to rainy manchester. This plane is the largest in a fleet of aircraft and was assembled by the Civil Aviation authority to bring thousands of people home. This shows how different repatriations is to running an airline, they leave uk airports empty but when they are in majorca, authorities get as many people as possible on board. Before the company went bust, there were seven thomas cook flights scheduled to leave palma today for uk airports. With this giant aircraft, those seven flights become one into manchester. It has been fabulous, the holiday was fabulous. Information was fabulous. We have to get to manchester, we got a coach down, so what, people have lost theirjobs, a coach down, so what, people have lost their jobs, its a coach down, so what, people have lost theirjobs, its all been fabulous. Initially, yes, it was worrying. Very lucky, considering all of the staff who have more than that really. Then, the flight back and the paper cups a reminder about who was supposed to fly them home. But, some did travel in style for the first time. Never thought i would see the day that we would be sat in business class, i think it is ace you can believe it when we came up the steps, we are in business class, arent we . Brilliant, weve never flown like this before the Civil Aviation authority had to operate a complicated flight schedule over two weeks. Overall, it was a job well done. The planning had paid off, some problems were just hard to foresee. Silly things, anyway, would go wrong. For example, there were fourairports in cuba. Because we only had one big plane, we thought it would be sensible to amalgamate everyone to one airport, but there wasnt enough fuel in cuba to bus all those people to one airport. It was things like that that went wrong all the time. I was very glad when the last plane landed it was, for many, notjust a job, but a dreamy lifestyle. Travel, sunshine, and working for a powerful brand. But in a flash, it was all gone. 9000 people in the uk had lost theirjobs. Is it here we sign for the redundancy courses . They came together soon after at manchester airport. As i got to the airport, i started to cry because i thought ive come here in a uniform, but ive got nowhere to go. My colleague Simon Browning was there. People who ive spoken to, nobody expected it to happen. It was like the death, a death in theirfamily. They had worked together and known the structure and suddenly, it vanished. My name is betty knight. I was cabin crew for Thomas Cook Airlines for 12 years. Our management seem to have disappeared into the sunset with millions and millions of pounds. While all of our lovely passengers and customers have been helped by the Civil Aviation authority who have done an incredible job and they have been assisted, our cabin crew, members of our cabin team, have been stuck without even a word or a phone call. In really dire circumstances. What do we want . Answers when do we want them . Now within days, thomas cook staff had travelled from different parts of the country to westminster. We wa nt a nswers the impact of what had happened was still sinking in. We just cannot understand what has gone wrong. Weve not been paid, a lot of us have children and mortgages, people have gone to food banks. Its unbelievable we are in this situation. We have just been pushed out. I wont get anotherjob, im too old to be employed now. Its a travesty. 0ur lives are ruined because of Thomas Cook Airlines uk. But top of their minds were questions about how the business went under. Why did this company not go into administration but they went into liquidation overnight, in two hours. Why . Its not on, we need answers and we need them now. All of the big ceos and their big bonuses, we know they need to have bonuses but they must have known what was going on. Peter fankhauser has a lot to answer for. Peter fankhauser was in charge when thomas cook went bust. This is a statement i hoped i would would never have to make. It is deeply distressing to me that it has not been possible to save one of the most loved brands in travel. Thank you. He was paid more than £8 million in the last five years. Weeks later, he was grilled by mps. Do you think that bonus should be paid back . I can say i worked tirelessly for the success of this company and im deeply sorry i was not able to secure the deal. This man also faced questions. Can we just ask, do you feel responsible for the failure of the company . Manny Fontenla Novoa was responsible for the company when the debt really grew. He insisted he was not to blame for the demise of the company. When we heard the news on the morning of the 23rd, i was still awake. I was watching it unfold. I was heartbroken, devastated. For about two weeks after that, i couldnt even get dressed. I couldnt face the world. Got a bit anxious. Suffered from anxiety and depression actually as well. It took me a good three or four weeks to be able to go back out there and start applying forjobs. When that came to an end for me and i realised i was no longer involved in that industry, it was such a shock. The benefits, emotionally and psychologically, to fly are great. When that ends as suddenly as it did, it is a huge loss. People who were not earning huge salaries at thomas cook are facing a new reality this christmas. Im now near retirement. It is not likely i will get anotherjob. Its just. Why did it finish in that way . Thats not how i wanted to finish my career. It is a big feeling of loss. One of our friends, she ended up with her partner using her redundancy to live in a hotel, in a b8b and she was declared homeless. She has been on the waiting list. Another friend was put out of her accommodation very quickly. She is having to be supported. It happened so quickly, overnight. What do you think the overall impact has been on you, in the three months since . Simon has discovered many people still out of work have struggled to get Financial Support from the state. I think the system has failed me. It isntjust me. Loads of ex colleagues going through the same situation and the system has failed us. We paid tax and National Insurance all our lives to be given nothing. It makes me angry and frustrated with the system. Ive paid my tax. When i needed the department for work and pensions, when i needed jobseekers allowance, i havent been able to access that. My claim for that has been cancelled by them three times. And then i am told that i caused the delay . You are left bewildered by the system. We put all of these claims to the department for work and pensions, they have said they are sorry and are urging all former thomas cook staff to keep in touch with theirjob centres so they can urgently try and fix these claims. Thomas cook staff are also perplexed by the fact that the companys german airline, condor, was kept afloat and is still operating today. The government was forced to defend its decision not to save thomas cooks uk airline. Whilst i hear people saying, why didnt you just put the money in, the answer is, all you would have to do is open their books and realise, if you have £1. 7 billion of debt, if you lost £1. 5 billion in six months alone, if you issued another profit warning, this is entirely different to the condor situation which was a fundamentally profitable airline. But a positive turnaround for some staff, who went back to work. Hays travel announced it was saving around 500 thomas cook stores. Im sat with all of my team now, they would all be happy to come back to the branch. Nicola and her colleagues, who thought they had lost theirjobs, were with the bbcs Coletta Smith when they got a call to say that they were now not unemployed. They are opening and we just have to contact them. Clapping it wasjust incredible, for me one of the most amazing moments as a journalist to be in the room at that moment when someones life is turned around in seconds. They thought they would be made redundant. They were already looking for other jobs, looking for other work but then to be told they got theirjobs back was incredible. They were in tears, hugging each other. We were joining in. They were in tears, hugging each other. We were joining in. You couldnt not, in a room like that. It was so exciting and emotional. Just incredible to be there. As travel evolved over the decades, thomas cook navigated huge change and reaped the rewards. But, in 2019, that romanticjourney came to an abrupt end. Thomas cook employees and thomas cook customers, whether they had their holiday or were waiting for the insurance to pay out, and our staff and all the people who help, it was Something Like 1 Million People affected. Its an enormous number and on top of that, youve got all of those hotels abroad and in some areas, these hotels were really relying on thomas cook passengers to revitalise the economy. Certainly the biggest story ive ever covered in 13. 5 years of travel trade journalism. We will continue to write about it for years, if not decades, i am sure. I think it has been a National Scandal to let a company of that size and heritage and historyjust fall like that. Life has moved on, and i dont think you ever will get the answer to questions that the crew and people who work for thomas cook would say. The oldest brand in British Travel is gone. And those who were the heart and soul of the company will be picking up the pieces well into the new year. We want answers, we want them now what do we want . Answers when do we want them . Now we have heavy showers and thunderstorms across south wales, the Bristol Channel and southern areas of england. You can see from the radar images from early on, they are moving eastwards to the south east. Rain across Northern Areas is easing off, and will continue to ease as we go through the rest of today. As we go through into the evening and overnight, there will still be a few showers dotted around. For the rest of the afternoon, still though showers across the south, but the really heavy thundery ones will tend to ease off. There will be a few bright spells developing. Quite cloudy for many of us throughout the afternoon. Maximum temperatures up to form 6 degrees in scotland and northern ireland, as high as ten or 12, 13 degrees further south. Through this evening and tonight, well, if you showers continuing. 0ne evening and tonight, well, if you showers continuing. One two mist and fog patch is developing. Generally speaking, a quiet night. Clear skies, temperatures will start to fall away. It could be a little bit chilly into Christmas Day morning. Temperatures down to team or three celsius. Perhaps even a touch of frost first thing. That may be the White Christmas you will get. There is no snow in the forecast for Christmas Day. There will be lots of dry and sunny weather. 0ne Christmas Day. There will be lots of dry and sunny weather. One of two mist and fog patches in the morning. They will tend to clear away quite quickly and then there will be some sunshine. Perhaps the shower in the far north of scotland. As you can see, right across the uk, it is largely dry and there will be some sunshine. Temperature is about the average for the time of year, about six or nine celsius. If you are travelling later on Christmas Day, into the evening, watch out for some folk developing across central, eastern and Northern Areas in particular. Further west, the breeze picks up year, as we go into boxing day. With that, this area of low pressure moving on from the west. The weather fronts moving their way in as well. Its going to be a very different day on boxing day. Rain in the morning, moving eastwards. Some of that could be on the heavy side. The breeze picking up, may be hell snow in northern england, southern scotland, into the afternoon in northern scotland. As that clears away, the middle part of the day is actually dry with some brighter skies. The showers moving their way in from the west. Temperature is creeping up in the west as well. For the end of the decade, as we finished 2019, the weather is going to remaina finished 2019, the weather is going to remain a little bit unsettled. Some rain at times. Temperature is about ten or 14 celsius. Nick miller will bring you your weather for the rest of the afternoon. That is all from me. Happy christmas this is bbc news, im christian fraser. The headlines at 12. The duke of edinburgh has left hospital in time to spend christmas with the queen at sandringham. The queen will use her Christmas Day message to say the past year has been quite bumpy, adding that small steps can heal divisions. Thousands of volunteer Fire Fighters will spend Christmas Day battling wildfires that are still ravaging australia. A warning from nhs england to parents, keep button batteries the type found in toys, festive lights, and musical christmas cards away from children. And in half an hours time, well get a glimpse into the rarely seen lives of five women photographers. Thats in through the lens here on bbc news