Simona Musu and Dean Scheepers couldn’t contain their excitement when they arrived at Male Velana International Airport in the Maldives on February 22nd.
The couple, who are originally from South Africa and live in Amsterdam, were visiting the island nation for a special occasion. They were there to exchange vows in an intimate beach ceremony, a prelude to a courthouse wedding scheduled for later this summer.
“We were on a cloud,” Muth told CNN Travel. “It was a very magical feeling. We went straight from the airport and there was someone who had written our name on a sign and took us to the seaplane and then to the resort.”
A week later, the couple returned to the airport. This time, however, their mood was much more rugged. The couple is one of tens of thousands of other travelers stranded following the February 28 attack on Iran by the United States and Israel, with flights back to the Netherlands the day before and thousands of others around the world canceled.
The following Monday, at least 100 of them crammed into Male Airport, commonly known as Malé Airport, charging cell phones, caring for young children and sleeping in empty spaces. “No one looked like they were vacationing on an island,” Scheepers said.
He and Ms Muth themselves had just returned from a luxurious week in an all-inclusive five-star hotel and were in a state of shock. The highlight was a wedding on the resort’s private white sand beach, complete with a Maldivian drummer and a walkway covered in rose petals and bright pink flowers.
Instead of returning to Amsterdam, where a group of family and friends were waiting for them to celebrate, Muth and Scheepers faced a less pleasant scenario. They have no place to stay, no future flight options, and no idea when or how they will return home.
“The week we spent at the resort was incredible,” says Muth. “The wedding day was perfect and beautiful and everything went according to plan. It was all downhill from there. It was an absolute nightmare.”
Two weeks into the conflict, global air travel and the tourism industry it drives continue to be disrupted, creating the worst travel crisis since the coronavirus pandemic.
About 52,000 flights have been canceled in the Middle East since the strike began, affecting about 6 million passengers, according to data from aviation analyst Cirium obtained by CNN on March 13. Despite continued uncertainty, some airports have resumed operations, including Dubai, Abu Dhabi and King Khalid International Airport near Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Before the crisis, the Middle East had established itself as a key region in the global aviation industry, driven by the growing influence of prominent hubs in the Gulf, including Dubai, home of Emirates, Abu Dhabi, home of Etihad Airways, and Doha, home of Qatar Airways. Cirium data shows that in 2025, around one in five passengers traveling between Europe and Asia Pacific flew on a Middle Eastern airline. Regional airlines are expected to carry approximately 240 million passengers in 2026, according to the International Air Transport Association.
But the immediate future looks even more uncertain as many airlines continue to struggle to cope with canceled flights and stranded travelers. Qatar Airways was one of the worst-hit airlines, with 69-81% of its flights canceled each day from March 7 to 11, for a total of 2,185 flights, according to data from flight tracking company FlightAware.
It’s a pattern Musu and Scheepers have experienced firsthand. Muth said her flight was changed and canceled a total of five times, turning what was initially a happy trip into a “protracted honeymoon disaster” that lasted almost three weeks. It’s nearly three times as long as they planned to spend in the Maldives.
They log hours online every day, scouring the internet and messaging airline customer service, trying to find alternative solutions. Some options are extremely expensive, at more than $3,000 for a one-way ticket, while others involve grueling travel times, such as the one discovered by Mus that takes a whopping 56 hours with multiple connections.
Further complicating the challenge is the issuance of visas required by countries including China and India for various flight routes within highly restricted airspace. The complexity of the aviation situation is further complicated by Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine.
Two weeks after the joint U.S.-Israel offensive began, competition for air travel remains incredibly fierce. “Everything moves so fast,” Scheepers said. “Even if you find a ticket, it’s gone within seconds.”
Several countries, including the Maldives, arranged repatriation flights, but the couple had no luck. Muth, who has Italian citizenship through his parents, contacted the Italian embassy in South Africa to ask if the couple could be booked on a flight from the Maldives to Rome with other Italians. But that request was “rejected,” Muth said, noting that Scheepers, who is not an Italian citizen, would not have been eligible anyway.
A repatriation flight is being planned for the South Africans, but the couple did not pursue that avenue as they were unsure whether the government could or would assist in the evacuation of the two nationals living abroad.
Instead, the couple focused on searching for the plane and enlisted the help of family and friends. “They ask us every day how we are, what we are doing and if we are okay,” Musu says, noting that the longer they stay in the Maldives, the more they worry about their loved ones. “Now they’re like, ‘This is a big deal, it’s not coming back.'”
Rooms without windows and other challenges
Musu and Scheepers constantly monitor airlines, flight-tracking websites, and news outlets, as well as closely track out-of-pocket costs. They do not have separate travel insurance and are hoping that the insurance provided by the American Express credit card they used to book the trip will cover at least some of the approximately $5,800 to $7,000 additional costs incurred since their initial stay at the resort.
The couple stayed an extra night at their original resort after management offered guests affected by the cancellation a 50% discount off the regular rate of about $1,500. But we couldn’t afford to stay there forever, so we took the waiter’s advice and moved to another island called Maafushi, which had several more affordable hotel options.
After taking a seaplane back to Male on their way to Maafushi, they booked a hotel using the airport’s Wi-Fi. Muth recalls an almost palpable level of collective stress among the stranded passengers. “I could feel the panic in the air,” she said, recalling her own frantic moment when she thought her bag was missing, before realizing “I had been carrying it the whole time.”
Since arriving in Maafushi about two weeks ago, the couple has stayed in three hotels. Some were so full that the only option was a bare, windowless room that, in Muth’s words, was “like being in a prison.”
Determined to find a better site for his excavations, Musu traveled around the island, inquiring at multiple properties, and by March 13th, he had found a home base. It was a “comfortable, clean” beachfront hotel for about $200 a night, she says. The staff has been accommodating couples to extend their stays each time a flight has been cancelled.
The days settled into a predictable rhythm. Scheepers first woke up around 6 a.m. and spent several hours searching for flights and checking the news. After breakfast, Muth took over the search, and Scheepers turned his attention to his job in the insurance company’s finance department. He says he’s grateful he brought his laptop and that his boss is “really understanding.”
Like Scheepers, Muth is grateful that her boss was supportive and understanding of her situation. But like the two other teachers from Slovenia she met in the Maldives, she is eager to get back into the classroom. “We feel extra pressure to work directly on our work,” Muth says. “That’s what this job entails. I really miss my students and colleagues.”
The couple estimates there are hundreds of other stranded travelers in the Maldives, many from Europe. They say they have met at least a dozen people, including a French family with a toddler, a German Apple executive, and two backpackers from the UK and Ireland, with whom they are in constant contact, sharing travel tips and updates on a WhatsApp group.
“As soon as I hear their accent and understand their language, I immediately ask, ‘How are you doing?'” says Muth, who is fluent in Dutch. “Then we exchange numbers and the community comes into play.”
As their trip to the Maldives drags on, Muth and Scheepers have tried to maintain a positive attitude. They are grateful that, unlike many other travelers, they are not trapped in a war zone or stuck in an airport indefinitely, and that they have funds to cover their hotel and meals.
The tropical climate with sunny skies is also a plus. “It’s definitely very bronzed,” Muth says with a laugh.
But she doesn’t shy away from correcting people who think she lives a carefree island life drinking seaside daiquiris all day long. First of all, the Maldivian island of Maafushi is Muslim and alcohol is strictly prohibited.
“I actually cut them off and told them directly, ‘It’s not as fun as it looks,'” Muth says. “It’s stressful and there’s a lot of uncertainty. But we’re making the best of it.”
In a sense, this ordeal strengthened the couple’s bond. “I don’t know how I would have gotten through this without him,” Muth said. “I think I would have been surprised. We really balance each other out.”
The experience also led them to reflect on their common South African roots, particularly the African cultural concept of Ubuntu. Ubuntu, which roughly translates to “common humanity,” is an ancient term that evokes a spirit of helping others.
“In South Africa, people are kind and there is a strong sense of community,” Scheepers says. “South Africans always try to look at the positive side, so we have tried to bring that in.”
About two weeks after the couple’s trip took an unexpected turn, it appears their persistence is paying off. After receiving a tip late last week from a Dutch family that there might be a seat available on Saudi Arabia’s flag carrier flight, Scheepers immediately checked the website, only to find there were none available. But they keep an eye on things, and one recent morning at breakfast, Muth couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw two empty seats on a flight scheduled for March 13.
She quickly picked them up for about $980 per ticket as back-up on a Qatar flight back to the Netherlands. The flight was scheduled to be rescheduled for later in the week, but as of Tuesday it was the fifth time it had been canceled.
On Wednesday afternoon, Ms. Muth successfully checked in for her flight to Saudi Arabia. The flight included a 13-hour layover in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and was scheduled to arrive in Amsterdam just after 1pm on March 14 (a 25-hour journey).
“Certainly, I’m cautiously optimistic,” Muth says. “I have some confidence that this flight will be successful.”
Both men said they were “nervous” about the possibility of flying through the Middle East. But at the same time, they are desperate to get home. Musu says: “We will do whatever it takes to escape from paradise.”
