At one stage parents of the Banbury youngsters were told by airline Virgin Atlantic their plane had returned to Heath-row. In fact it was still iced up in the States.

The mistake has been described by one father as "unforgivable" after some parents drove to London expecting to be able to meet their children.

New York looked more like the Arctic after record snowfall which has been dubbed 'the Great Whiteout'.
Trapped in JFK airport were the 55 Oxford and Cherwell Valley College students and five teaching staff visiting the city as part of a five-day art and design field trip.

They were told not a single nearby hotel room was available so the Terminal Four departure lounge became home.

Course leader Chris Roberts let students use his mobile phone to call concerned parents – something that proved vital because of inaccurate information given out by Virgin customer services.

Simon Croghan, father of student Emma, said many parents kept each other up to date with information and were not happy with Virgin's customer services. It is their responsibility to find customers a hotel in situations like this.

"As for giving parents such wrong information, this is unforgivable from a company that prides itself on its brand and communication," he said.

He called for compensation for students, who boarded two flights before being told they had to get off again because it was too icy. One saw them slowly taxiing along the runway for eight hours.

Mr Roberts said: "We all got very tired and a bit emotional but there were few complaints. Everyone could see there was nothing anybody could do and the students were absolutely fantastic and no trouble whatsoever."

Hundreds of flights were cancelled as 26.9 inches of snow fell. Most passengers had been warned in advance by their tour operators but not the college group. They were almost the only people stranded in the terminal.

"We were provided with no-thing on the very first night, just a carpeted area separate from the seating," said Mr Roberts. "But we kept our spirits up and amused ourselves building a tent out of newspapers and our luggage, which some of us slept under."

On the second night they received blankets and throughout they were given food vouchers by Virgin.
JFK has seven terminals, linked by roads made somewhat impassable by the weather. Terminal Four has only a few shops, food outlets, a massage parlour and bar.

Students kept themselves amused by looking round the shops, playing games, watching DVDs on their laptops and drawing in sketch books.

A Virgin spokesman apologised for any inconvenience caused and claimed despite their best efforts all hotels in the JFK area were full.

She said parents had been wrongly told the plane had left New York because it had left the gate and customer services assumed it had taken off.

"Because it was on the runway for so long we would have only found out it hadn't after it was due to touch down in the UK," she added. "We have no control over extreme weather conditions and can only work within the systems we have."