Airline's pounds 100 charge for oxygen

The father of an 11-year-old boy seriously ill with cystic fibrosis yesterday criticised an airline for charging pounds 100 to provide oxygen for his son.

Frank Macanaspie, 43, from Tilbury, Essex, is travelling to Majorca next Thursday with wife Julia, 40, and James, who is being treated at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London. He said: "We're travelling with Britannia and they have told us we can't use our own oxygen, it has to be airline oxygen. I'm a fireman and I know it costs 30 pence to charge an oxygen cylinder. They want to charge us pounds 100 for the round trip, an hour and 50 minutes each way."

A spokesperson for Britannia said: "The carriage of any pressurised material on an aeroplane has to be certificated - you can't bring on just any bottle. We take considerable steps to make it possible for disabled people to travel with us. But, unfortunately, to cover the rising numbers requesting therapeutic oxygen it is necessary to make this charge."