Dubai: UAE residents who had booked holidays to Turkey are cancelling their flight and hotel reservations following the suicide bombing at Istanbul airport.

Travel agencies in Dubai confirmed that they have received a number of cancellation requests mostly from families who had intended to visit Turkey during the Eid holidays.  A number of UAE residents who are also in Turkey are scrambling to book flights back home.

“There’s a group of 17 people who just arrived yesterday at the very same airport where the bombing took place.  They’re supposed to stay in Turkey until July 2. They want to fly back right away,” Mariyam Kapasi, senior holiday consultant at Dubai Leisure Holidays, told Gulf News in a phone interview.

She said at least two more group bookings for six customers traveling to Turkey next week are also being canceled. 

The UAE is one of the major markets for the Turkish travel and tourism industry.  In 2015, UAE visitors made more than 56,000 trips to the country. The figure is forecast to rise to 68,000 by 2020, according to Euromonitor International data.

Kinda Chebib, lead analyst at Euromonitor International, said visitor arrivals in Turkey has been slowing down following increased frequency of terrorist attacks. The recent explosion is another major blow to Turkish tourism.

“Those repetitive explosions are expected to impact negatively not only on inbound flow to Turkey on the short-to-medium term, but also on the country’s economy,” said Chebib.

“This tragedy will certainly lessen the demand for travel from the UAE to Turkey in the short term, but delving back into the recent past, we are certainly hopeful that things will return to normal as Turkey is a very popular destination historically for Gulf tourists and it has so much to offer in terms of history, culture and natural beauty,” added Premjit Bangara, manager at Sharaf Travel.

Bangara expects booking cancellations to increase over the next few days. “It is normal for people to take stock of the situation especially after a horrific attack like the one witnessed in Istanbul. As yet, we have seen only one family booking being canceled but we do anticipate a few more [later] as news filters in on this attack,” Bangara said.

“We are also receiving calls from our clients who want the latest update on the situation there,” he added.