Ryanair passenger ‘scarred for all times’ with burns to legs after scalding tea spill

WARNING, GRAPHIC IMAGES: Susan Martin claims she has been left ‘scarred for life’ after reportedly suffering horrific burns while on a Ryanair flight from Bournemouth to Malta

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A holidaymaker claims she’s been left ‘scarred for life’ after reportedly suffering horror burns when ‘scalding’ tea spilt over her legs and privates on a Ryanair flight.

Susan Martin had been travelling from Bournemouth Airport to Malta with her husband Billy Martin, 63, for a week in the sun.

But 20 minutes into their Ryanair flight the gran-of-10 claims she was left ‘screaming’ in pain when the lid of her tea ‘popped off’, tipping boiling water all over her lap.

Horrific photos show Susan’s lower stomach, upper thighs and groin area red raw and blistered from where the hot water burnt her skin.

For the remainder of the three-hour flight, the claims she sat in the crew area ‘hyperventilating’ while Ryanair staff applied gel packs and iced water to her burns.

When the plane landed in Malta, the 69-year-old was blue-lighted straight to hospital where she had her injuries dressed.

After returning to the burns unit the following day, Susan then spent the rest of her holiday in hospital hooked up to an IV antibiotic and had her bandages changed daily.

The former receptionist said she had ordered the hot beverage through the airlines app as there was no drinks trolley on board on the flight last May.

Due to this, she claims the cup was filled using boiling water from the back of the plane rather than from the usual trolley, which Susan believes this is why the liquid was so hot.

Susan is now urging others to be careful when ordering hot beverages on flights to stop this happening to them and to make sure the lids are on correctly.

Susan, from Weymouth in Dorset, said: “It said to order drinks on the app so my husband ordered us a coffee and a tea and they brought the drink out.

“I had tea so it was just hot water with a teabag in it. It was a large cup. They put it on the drink tray and whether I knocked the tray or whether the steam popped the lid off, we don’t really know what happened, it just all happened so quickly.

‘It [the hot water] was all over my lap and I was screaming. I knew it was serious at this point. I started hyperventilating and I was in a lot of pain immediately.

“I was in shock as it was scalding water. The water came straight out of the water vessel at the back of the plane. They took me into the hold at the back. I took my trousers off and they were pouring cold water on me.

“She got the first aid box out and put gel packs and cream on me and kept changing them as they were getting warm really quickly. My legs had already started to blister. I was in shock and I was shaking.”

After arriving back in the UK, Susan had check-up and dressing appointments for the next six weeks.

Susan said: “I got second degree burns on my right upper thigh and lower abdomen and first degree burns to the left of the thigh and genital area. On the flight home they had a drinks trolley. My husband noticed that when they were putting the cups on the tray, they were telling people to be careful with the lids on the cups.

“They didn’t tell us this on the way out.

“I think the water was too hot as it was scalding hot. It shouldn’t have been that hot. It was an unfortunate accident and the lid shouldn’t have come off the cup.

“If the water comes out of the insulated jug on the drinks trolley, the drinks are never that hot.”

While on holiday Susan claims no one from the holiday rep team or Ryanair checked up on her in hospital and she has not received an apology from the airline since.

She is now raising awareness about her injuries and urges others to be careful when buying hot drinks on flights to stop this from happening to them.

Susan said: “I am scarred and I have to apply cream every day to keep the scar moist. I’m not allowed to go in the sun and for the rest of my life I have to keep it [the scars] covered.

“Can you imagine if that had been a young mother with a child or a baby on her lap. That would have been horrendous. I would hate anyone else to go through what I have been through and I’m still paranoid about hot drinks. I do still have flashbacks and I think I always will. I have stopped drinking hot drinks since this has happened.”

Ryanair declined to comment.