A stray seagull held up a flight for more than four hours leaving passengers furious.

A flight engineer had to be flown in to Newcastle Airport from London to check the plane before it could be allowed to leave on Saturday morning.

Even the captain of the flight to Gatwick said he was "embarrassed and angry" over the delay.

Businessman Dan Kirby was flying to his home in Sussex then the delay hit.

He said: "It is scandalous that there was no flight engineer on standby in Newcastle when five flights were leaving for the capital.

"British Airways should be ashamed of themselves, August bank holiday weekend is the busiest of the year, yet they didn't have a flight engineer on standby."

The plane was delayed as a precautionary measure because it had hit a seagull on the inward journey.

No one at City Flier Express, the British Airways subsidiary which ran the flight, was prepared to comment