It has been a long week of sleepless nights for Sorrel Ashton, an independent travel adviser who has been working around the clock to help her clients stuck in Dubai get home to the UK. “There has been a lot of stress and worry,” she told the Express. “A lot of clients were [in Dubai] on business, so they were separated from their families. There has been a lot of ‘please can you get me home to my family.'”

Ms Ashton said she has been “in crisis mode” since Saturday, when several clients sent her pictures of missiles being intercepted and landing in The Palm (Palm Jumeirah). She was able to get eight clients on a flight on Monday (March 2), but this was quickly cancelled, which has been the case for hundreds of thousands of passengers who remain stranded thanks to the closure of key air hubs amid conflict between the US, Israel and Iran. “I’ve pretty much been finding alternative flights for them constantly, but they’ve been moved and changed.”

She managed to get a group of four on a flight from Muscat, Oman, in the early hours of Tuesday morning (March 3), which departed at 2.40am.

“I’ve also been looking at air charters for a group. People have been desperate to get out.”

However, it was one case in particular that has stuck with Ms Ashton: a couple who weren’t originally her clients but asked for help after hearing she was helping people get out of the UAE.

“They were desperate to get out of the country. He is a war veteran, and they had shrapnel on their balcony,” Ms Ashton said. “He had a prosthetic leg that broke over the course of the week. So I sent them a link to a prosthetics clinic to try and help get it fixed, because he was just literally keeping it together with duct tape.

“His other half was having panic attacks and I think being on The Palm wasn’t helping, so we moved them to another hotel. That one’s been really difficult.”

“They came to me and asked if there was anything I could do. I found them a flight that was due to leave on March 9, but I was then able to get them on a waitlist so they were then potentially leaving on the 3rd. That got cancelled, but they’ve just taken off.”

“I feel like I got clients out before the British Government even did anything,” Ms Ashton said, adding that she did not understand why it is not working with Emirates to bring people home. “The flight they put on has gone out of Muscat, which is five hours across the desert – it’s a hard border crossing, it isn’t straightforward.

“I was giving some advice to a couple – she’s pregnant, and they’ve got a 13-month-old with them. I was telling them which flight she needed to look at, as they were considering Muscat. I told them they needed to think about how they would get there and how many flights were actually leaving Muscat. I said: ‘There are a few, but you might need to wait a while. And with such a young baby, it’s a really long journey, a lot of waiting around.'”

“I got people out of the country, I would say, a full 36 hours before the Government did, so why aren’t they using the channels that I’m using?”

The first UK government charter repatriation flight left Muscat for London Stansted on Thursday (March 5). Originally scheduled for Wednesday, the flight was delayed by nearly 24 hours due to technical issues and finally landed in the UK on Friday morning.

Regarding the general mood in Dubai, Ms Ashton said the level of worry depends on where you are: “People are much more scared in The Palm, I think, probably because there are a lot more tourists there. Away from there, it’s almost business as usual – its quite calm, people are still going to the gym, still sitting on the beach.”

As Ms Ashton specialises in premium tailor-made travel with a focus on Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the US, she has many clients who are transiting via the Middle East. “I’ve had to divert or completely change holidays,” she said. “I had one client who was supposed to be going to Thailand via Abu Dhabi, but they’re now going to Morocco. I had another client whose flight was so expensive to Kuala Lumpur an alternative way, that they’re now going to Seville.”

“There are more flights coming on every single day, so I’m confident that all my clients are going to get home.”

The most worrying part, she said, is what will happen to future bookings. She said she has already heard from families who don’t want to go, and she has issued full refunds for clients who no longer want to travel next week.

“I’m just being as flexible as I can as things are changing so quickly” she said. “I’m an independent adviser and I want to keep my customers. I want to do everything I can to make sure they’re as happy as possible with me.”