Virgin Atlantic has said it is helping to bring back Thomas Cook customers and staff back from the Caribbean and US.

The airline said on Twitter that affected passengers should call its team on +44(0)344 742 4384.

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First Monarch, now Thomas Cook. But these are just two of the higher profile failures in the airline travel industry. In fact, the UK's Civil Aviation Authority deals with "about 15 or 20 companies that go into liquidation every year," the regulator's chairwoman, Dame Deidre Hutton, told Today.

So is the CAA watching nervously any other travel firms in difficulty? "There's no body else we are worried about of this sort of scale."

She said Thomas Cook was operating in an "incredibly competitive" market, but had some specific problems - such as failing to adapt to changing consumer demands.

A comment she heard a couple of days ago sums up the issue, Dame Deidre said: "Thomas Cook is operating on brochures, whereas the world has moved on to barcodes."

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British Airways is helping to transport Thomas Cook customers back to the UK.

It said: "We are one of a number airlines supporting the CAA with its efforts to bring Thomas Cook customers back home to the UK at the end of their holidays.

"We will help as much as we can in the coming days."

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Gary Thickbroom, a passenger on the last-ever Thomas Cook Airlines flight, which landed on Monday morning in Manchester from Orlando, Florida said: "We sort of gathered that as we took off and then on the flight there were all different rumours.

"It came to light when the captain thanked us all for us past… number of years.

"All the cabin crew – even though they knew what was happening – were very profession still really friendly.

"The emotional part was leaving the plane."

Gary's wife Diane added that all the cabin crew "were all in tears when we got off the plane and there were some ground staff all lined up either side just all in tears, holding hands and ready to greet all the staff off the plane".

Jet2 has said prices for its flights may rise with increased demand following Thomas Cook's demise.

In a tweet, the Leeds-based airline told a customer it was "saddened" by the news but that its live system takes in various factors, including demand and availability, when generating prices.

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Tourism in Crete will be badly hit by the Thomas Cook collapse, according to Michalis Vlatakis, chairman of the Association of Cretan Tourism and Travel Agencies.

“It’s a magnitude 7 earthquake for tourism in Crete," he told the Athens News Agency.

"We are waiting for the tsunami any time soon. It will leave indelible scars on Greek tourism.

"We now have to treat our customers with the best possible way so that they don’t leave and never plan to come back”.

According to ACTTA, around 70% of tourist business in Crete has contracts with Thomas Cook.

The collapsed travel company flew 400.000 visitors to the Greek island this year while there are an estimated 20,000 tourists who are visiting the island with Thomas Cook right now.

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If you booked a package holiday with Thomas Cook, ATOL and ABTA schemes should mean full refunds.

But if you who booked flights only, you may be unprotected, warns MoneySavingExpert Martin Lewis.

"Travel insurance won’t help for most, as travel company failure cover is rarely included as standard – though check your policy or give them a call."

He advises:

• If you did book without travel industry or insurance protection, the next route is your card provider. Those who paid more than £100 on a credit card get Section 75 legal protection – which means the card firm is jointly liable with the retailer, so you can get your money back from it.
• However this may not work if you booked via an agency, or via certain PayPal transactions, as that break in the direct transactional relationship can stop it working – we wait to see how widespread that problem will be.
• If that happens, or you paid by debit card, instead ask your bank to do a ‘chargeback’. This isn’t a legal protection – it is a Visa, Mastercard and Amex rule where your bank gets your money back from Thomas Cook’s bank as you didn’t receive what you paid for. It should work for most people.
• Those who paid by other methods such as cheques or cash have very little protection sadly.

Dominic O'Connell
Business Presenter, BBC Radio 4 Today programme

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For Thomas Cook’s unfortunate staff, customers and shareholders, history has come full circle. Eight years ago the company lurched perilously close to the edge of insolvency after trading turned sour. It was pulled back from the brink by an emergency loan from a group of banks led by Royal Bank of Scotland – ironically the same bank whose demand for extra money appears to have sunk the company this time.

As well as weak trading, the company’s big problem in 2011 was too much debt – about £2bn when the pension deficit was included. It tried to put its borrowing problem behind it in 2013, with a £425m fundraising from shareholders. This money was meant not only to deal with the balance sheet, but also to pay for an organisational overhaul led by a charismatic new chief executive, Harriet Green. Her reign lasted just over two years before she was replaced by Peter Fankhauser.

Fast forward six years and Thomas Cook is back where it was. All the rescue money is gone, and the debt pile is back to £1.6bn. Again it has been thumped by poor trading and a series of one-offs, notably weak sterling and a summer heatwave that led to a downturn in demand. But there is evidence of deeper problems, and a lack of management control. The company stopped paying dividends to shareholders in 2011 as the previous crisis hit – but resumed them in 2017 and again last year, an odd thing to do if trading, and solvency was tight. The company’s results were marked by exceptional, one-off items, always a red flag for analysts, and the negotiations over the restructuring plan have been chaotic.

After the immediate repatriation and staff problems have been resolved, one question remains – will Thomas Cook live on in some form? The brand, one of the most famous in world travel, should be worth something. The obvious buyer would be Fosun, the Chinese conglomerate that was the British company’s largest shareholder. But they, and other buyers, may conclude the messy nature of the weekend’s collapse may have blighted the brand irretrievably.

Birmingham Airport has announced that all Thomas Cook flights have been cancelled and passengers are asked not to go to the airport.

It said it was "working closely with the CAA and the DfT to also support the effort to repatriate customers back to the UK over the coming weeks".

The airline was Birmingham’s fifth largest carrier and based four aircraft at the airport.

Details can be found here on what to do if you are currently abroad, external.

Cruise giant P&O has said bookings made through Thomas Cook still stand.

Asked by a customer on Twitter about a booking made through the now-collapsed travel firm, P&O said: "We will handle every stage of your booking just as your Thomas Cook agent would have done."

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A perhaps little known fact about Thomas Cook is that it runs a football holiday operation where supporters can follow their team.

Liverpool Football Club said this morning: "We are aware Thomas Cook has ceased trading this morning.

"Thomas Cook sells 360 hospitality packages for each of our home games at Anfield.

"We are currently assessing the impact of Thomas Cook ceasing trading and the impact for those supporters who have purchased packages from Thomas Cook. Once we have those details from Thomas Cook we will update supporters."

The BBC's Gavin Lee has been at Palma airport on Majorca where staff are advising Thomas Cook customers hoping to return to the UK today.

He said four departure flights are being replaced like-for-like while a fifth to Glasgow would now be diverted to Birmingham.

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The last Thomas Cook Airlines flight has landed at Manchester Airport.

The Airbus A330-200 aircraft touched down at around 8.40am BST after departing Orlando, Florida.

It was allowed to continue its journey as it was in the air at the time Thomas Cook officially collapsed at 2am BST.

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Shares in travel companies have rising sharply this morning following the demise of Thomas Cook.

TUI is leading the FTSE 100 gainers, with its share price up nearly 10% at 924.2p.

International Consolidated Airlines Group, the owner of British Airways, saw it share price rise by 1.5% at 485.4p.

easyJet's stock jumped by 6.2% to £11.23.

EasyJet said this morning: "We are sorry to see the news about Thomas Cook and appreciate the anxiety that their customers will be facing now.

“EasyJet is working with the CAA to provide a fully crewed A320 aircraft to support the repatriation efforts over the coming days.

“Customers can find out how to book on to the repatriation flights through the CAA website."

The FTSE 100 is trading 0.34% lower at 7,319.85. The FTSE 250 is off 0.52% at 20,064.10.

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Thomas Cook and its airline played a crucial part in other travel firms' operations.

TUI UK has said that some of its customers may be affected by the collapse.

The company said: "As we offer a small selection of TUI holidays featuring Thomas Cook flights, as well as selling a small number of Thomas Cook holidays through our stores, we’re now working alongside the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to assist affected customers."

TUI is offering advice to customers on its website, external.

The BBC's China correspondent Robin Brant has been watching Fosun closely today - and investors are reacting badly to the latest on Thomas Cook.

Fosun is a Chinese company that owns Club Med and was putting up £450m of a £900m rescue package for Thomas Cook.