Americans stuck in the Middle East recount finding their way home with little government help
ABC News
Stranded Americans across the Middle East say they’ve been left to navigate flight cancellations and confusing government guidance on their own
Alyssa Ramos' evacuation from Kuwait involved a 48-hour journey across four continents. The U.S. government did not help with any of it, the travel blogger said.
“They keep going on the news and saying they’re doing everything they can to get Americans out," Ramos said after landing in Miami on Thursday. “I know for a fact they’re not.”
She said she repeatedly messaged the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait and was directed to the consular section, which told her it couldn't help her leave the country and that she should enroll in the U.S.'s smart traveler program and shelter in place.
Ramos is one of the many Americans and citizens of other countries who evacuated from the Middle East or were still stranded there Friday, almost a week after Israeli-U.S. attacks on Iran rapidly entangled more than a dozen nearby countries. U.S. citizens described frustrations and growing fear as they encountered closed airports, canceled flights and alarming U.S. government guidance while Poland, Australia, France and other countries more quickly dispatched military or chartered planes to bring their citizens home.
“Having the State Department or whoever tell us, you need to get out immediately, well, but there’s no help. So you’re on your own to get your own travel plans. That was the most stressful thing," Chicago resident Susan Daley said after arriving Thursday on the first commercial flight from Dubai to San Francisco since the Iran war began on Feb. 28. Daley had been on a work trip in the United Arab Emirates.
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