A shuttle bus transporting Air Europa crew from the airport to their hotel was attacked. Private security guards escorting the crew engaged the assailants in a gunfight, manging to deter them. The bus, scheduled to drop off the arriving crew and collect the crew designated to operate the return flight to Madrid, returned to the airport with both sets of crew members as those arriving, no longer feeling safe in the city, demanded to be flown back to Madrid. Pilot and cabin crew unions demanded that Air Europa cancel its crew layovers in Caracas due to the increasing unrest in Venezuela. Air Europa then introduced an additional stop – Punta Cana, Dominican Republic – so the crews could layover there.