‘This Dubai holiday was supposed to relax me before chemo but it has turned into a nightmare’

A mother-of-one from Plymouth, with stage three lung cancer, has spoken of her fear of getting desperately sick whilst stranded as suicide drones rained down on Dubai.

‘I have terrible chest pain probably caused by the cancer and the stress of being stuck far away from home is making my symptoms worse,’ Linzi Stone told the Metro.

‘I feel like my health is suddenly getting worse and I’m terrified about what may happen if I need urgent medical care.’

The 47-year-old, who is staying at the Palm Atlantis hotel with her husband Paul and their eleven-year-old daughter Summer, was due to fly home last Sunday after a week’s holiday. Instead, after their flight was cancelled, they have been left in the dark about when they can return home.

‘We flew Virgin Airways and the lack of information has been bad so we have no idea when we can get out of here,’ she added.

‘It doesn’t help that the hotel are still charging us £500 a day to be here.’

Having discovered a lump on her collar bone in January, Mrs Stone was advised by her doctor to have a biopsy which led to the hospital diagnosing her with a tumour on the lung. ‘The news absolutely floored me as it is a mutation that can effect young women and non-smokers and up until then I was fit and healthy.

‘This holiday was meant to be a relaxing break ahead of starting chemotherapy which was due to take place on Friday. Instead, it has turned into a nightmare.’

It was as they were in the hotel swimming pool on Saturday that the family were first alerted to the signs that something was wrong.

‘I didn’t understand at first what was happening,’ explained Mrs Stone.

‘I suddenly became absolutely terrified as friends from home were texting me to ask if I was ok and just at that moment a drone got intercepted above our heads and we all panicked and ran inside.

‘We then heard throughout the day and night booms and planes above our head and alerts coming in on our phones.’

Since then, the family have not been allowed to venture far from the hotel pool area, with restrictions in place to stay nearby.

‘It’s all been surreal and scary and the worst part is the lack of information,’ added Mrs Stone.

‘I have informed the UK embassy and our airline about my urgent medical needs and there has been no response from either so I’m at a loss what to do next. It’s an absolute mess.

‘I need to have chemotherapy urgently and am so scared about going downhill and getting very sick out here.’

Tens of thousands of airline passengers are stranded by the Iran war that has spread across the Gulf region, but some wealthy travellers are getting out – by paying large sums for luxury flights to Europe via airports that are safe from Iranian drone and missile attacks.

Demand for charter flights has skyrocketed, with some people paying up to £175,000 after major airports in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha, Qatar, were closed after the start of the conflict last weekend.

Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said around 130,000 British nationals have registered their presence in the Middle East.

One mother Harriet Aldridge, who recently moved to Dubai, luckily evaded a drone strike on her neigbour’s building.

She told Metro: ‘It’s been a very surreal 36 hours.

‘So we live in an apartment within Town square, but we didn’t feel safe watching missiles being intercepted directly above our building.

‘Luckily a friend who had fled for Fujairah kindly offered us her house as an alternative.

‘Which was a good thing we did – as only a few hours later, the apartment block next to ours got hit by a drone that failed to detonate. Which was very scary.

‘We also have friends staying with us who came here on holiday for four nights without their children and are desperately waiting to hear when they can fly back to their children.

‘We’ve stayed home and inside monitoring the explosions and luckily today we’ve only experienced missiles this morning, so it’s feeling much calmer now.

She added on how she has been keeping busy while staying at home. ‘To be honest, it’s felt a lot like lockdown – we’ve been watching movies, playing games and lots of FaceTiming our families in the UK.

‘Luckily, my daughter is only three so we told her the bangs were Mr Bull from Peppa Pig, digging up the road and she seemed happy enough with that explanation.’

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