Florida couple forced to pay $1000 to escape Dubai during anniversary trip after no help from U.S.

An anniversary trip turned dangerous fast

Krista Jucknath Hickman and her husband Mike, a couple from Lakeland, Fla., were supposed to be celebrating their anniversary. They had planned a trip from Dubai to Nepal and India.

Instead, on Saturday, Feb. 28, their flight stopped on the tarmac at Dubai International Airport as U.S. and Israeli military strikes hit Iran.

Iran fired back with missiles and drones targeting the UAE and other countries across the region. The couple spent a full night and day stuck in a crowded airport.

She signed up for alerts but got none

Hickman did everything she was supposed to. She registered her trip with the State Department before leaving the country.

But she said she never got a security alert before the strikes started. The U.S. Embassy in Abu Dhabi told Americans to shelter in place after the attacks began.

Hickman tried reaching both the embassy and her airline, but said nobody could give her a straight answer about what to do or where to go next.

The State Department offered no real options

Hickman called the State Department twice looking for help. Both times, she said, they told her no evacuation plan existed.

She described the government’s guidance as unrealistic and unhelpful.

The only suggestion she got was to book a new flight, but flights kept getting canceled one after another.

With no clear path out through official channels, the couple started looking for another way to leave the country on their own.

They paid $1,000 for a ride through the desert

After watching flight after flight get scrubbed, the Hickmans gave up on the airport.

They hired a driver for $1,000 to take them overland from Dubai across the border into Oman, where flights were still leaving. The drive took them through the desert overnight.

It was a gamble, but staying put felt worse.

Oman’s airspace stayed open through the crisis, which made its capital, Muscat, a lifeline for stranded travelers across the region.

A drone hit where they had been standing

Hours after the Hickmans left Dubai, a drone struck Terminal 3 at the airport.

Mike Hickman told 10 Tampa Bay the strike hit the area where they had just been standing, near a coffee shop. Both Dubai International Airport and Abu Dhabi’s Zayed International Airport were damaged from Iranian strikes.

The airports suspended regular commercial flights after the attacks. The couple’s decision to leave by car may have kept them out of harm’s way.

Thousands of Americans faced the same chaos

The Hickmans were far from alone. An estimated 500,000 to more than one million Americans live across the Middle East.

Former congressman Jason Altmire, also stuck in Dubai, said thousands of Americans were stranded right alongside him. Others reported getting contradictory guidance from the government.

Some said officials told them to evacuate while the airspace was closed and no flights were available, leaving them with no real way to follow those instructions.

Flights vanished across the entire region

Airspace shut down over the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, and Syria.

Aviation analytics firm Cirium reported that more than 19,000 of about 51,600 scheduled flights were canceled in the days following the strikes.

Dubai and Abu Dhabi serve as major global hubs connecting Europe, Africa, and Asia, so the ripple effects stretched far beyond the Middle East.

UAE officials provided food and housing for more than 20,000 stranded travelers of all nationalities.

The government scrambled days after the strikes

On Monday, March 2, the State Department urged Americans to leave 14 Middle Eastern countries right away. By Tuesday, March 4, it announced charter flights from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan for U.S. citizens.

The department said it had reached about 3,000 Americans seeking help. More than 9,000 Americans had already made it home on their own in the days after the strikes.

The government also said it would not ask citizens to pay back travel costs.

Critics said the government had no plan ready

President Trump said there was no evacuation plan because the strikes happened so fast.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the main problem was that airspace closures kept grounding chartered and military planes.

Sen. Andy Kim pushed back, saying the late warning during closed airspace showed a lack of planning. The State Department’s own automated hotline told callers not to count on the government for evacuation at that time.

Some travelers spent a fortune escaping

Not everyone could get out for $1,000. Some wealthy travelers paid up to about $232,000 for private charter flights to Europe.

Others drove four to 10 hours overland to Muscat, Oman, or Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to reach airports that were still running. Oman’s open airspace made Muscat a key departure point for people from across the region.

Saudi Arabia kept most of its airspace operating despite partial closures near Iraq and the Persian Gulf.

The Hickmans finally got out on their anniversary

The couple made it to Oman and caught a flight to India to continue their trip.

Mike Hickman spoke to 10 Tampa Bay from an Oman airport at 3:30 a.m. local time on Wednesday, their actual anniversary.

He said when he called the State Department’s Washington number, he was told stranded Americans had to find their own way out.

Their experience matched a pattern reported by Americans across the region: told to leave, but given no real help to do it.

The situation keeps changing by the hour

The crisis in the Middle East remains active as of this writing. Airspace closures, flight schedules, and evacuation options are shifting constantly.

The State Department said it is working to arrange more charter and military flights as conditions allow. Americans still in the region should watch official State Department channels for updates.

Secretary Rubio said the government is confident it will help every American who needs to get out.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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