Businessman Gavin Mailer told The Royal Gazette that "as far as I'm concerned, this is the safest place to be" after his British Airways flight from London to Miami was diverted to the Island.

Mr. Mailer, 49, was one of hundreds of visitors diverted to the Island after US authorities shut down domestic airspace after yesterday's attack on the World Trade Centre yesterday.

Approximately 250 guests flooded Sonesta Beach Resort and hotel staff were quick to act upon hearing about the diverted flights, calling in all staff to report to work.

Resort vice president and managing director Dennis Tucker said the hotel was now operating at cost and making no profit from the batch of stranded guests.

"You don't ever capitalise off of a disaster. That is the philosophy of the Sonesta Corporation. We're making no profit at all.

"As soon as we heard the news of this devastating event, we called a meeting of all of our management staff to discuss response.

"Immediately after, we had a general staff meeting and informed them of what our operational plans were for the rest of the day," he said.

"We're very proud of our staff. We called all of our staff in and all responded; they were incredible. We and Bermuda should be proud of them," said Mr. Tucker.

The communications centre is composed of resources taken from conference services including phones and laptop computers.

Mr. Tucker said staff voluntarily put their own computers in the communications centre for guests to use.

"In a catastrophe such as this, our responsibility is to make guests as comfortable as possible," he said.

In addition, the hotel began to shuttle "emotional" guests to St. Anne's Church in Southampton.

"Some people were very, very upset and quite emotional; we have directed them to St. Anne's Church."

Mr. Mailer said: "Forty-five minutes before we reached America, we were told that US airspace was closed, which is unprecedented.

"They didn't inform us why (American airspace was closed). We landed and then the pilot, who was female, informed us between three and five aircraft had been hijacked and used as guided missiles.

"There was no panic, there was a low occupancy (on the aircraft). As far as I'm concerned, this is safest place to be with the bomb threat at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (in Germany)," he said.

Mr. Mailer was on his way to visit his daughter in Miami.