"WELCOME to Edinburgh” is a fairly benign collection of words. To many they will signal something pleasant; a visit to the castle, a day at the Festival, a trip to the zoo to see pandas that refuse to reproduce. This is all well and good. But not when you expect to be in Dusseldorf.

British Airways (BA) has been left a little crimson in the coupon after a flight from London bound for Germany landed in Scotland by mistake. Oops.

But there was a really good reason for this, yes? Perhaps the plane was diverted because a passenger had taken ill; or maybe there was a safety concern.

Erm … nah. The cause of this dramatic destination debacle was a mix-up with the paperwork.

The passengers only realised the error when the plane, which had left from London City, landed and the welcome announcement was made. They thought it was a joke until the captain entered the cabin and asked people to put up their hands if they were expecting to go to Dusseldorf. They were later taken on to the German city after a two-hour delay on the runway. Edinburgh Airport said the landing was a “surprise”.

WDL Aviation ran the BA flight through a leasing deal. BA said it was working with the company to find out why it filed the wrong flight plan. WDL said: “At no time has the safety of passengers been compromised. We flew the passengers on the flight with number BA3271 to Dusseldorf after the involuntary stopover in Edinburgh.”

“Involuntary stopover”? That’s one way to put it!

This aviation adventure raises some obvious questions. Was no-one looking out of the windows as the plane came in to land? Did no-one spot the Forth bridges? All three of them? The rather large and very distinctive Forth bridges? And what about the small matter of air traffic control? Surely there are some checks in place for the odd time an airline responsible for the lives of its passengers and crew gets its pesky paperwork muddled up.

I do sympathise with such disorientation. My own sense of direction leaves much to be desired. But I’m only in charge of a Peugeot 107, not a bloody great aeroplane.

Meanwhile, rivals Ryanair tried to capitalise on the muddle, but the joke backfired on the budget airline. A post on Ryanair’s official Twitter account said the company had a “present” for BA – a copy of Geography For Dummies.

Twitter users responded by making a number of suggestions of books Ryanair could read, including “Customer Service For Dummies”.

Another mused that Ryanair probably would have charged extra for the experience. And a fellow tweeter pointed out: “May I remind @Ryanair of the flight FR8582 from London to Thessaloniki, Greece, that landed to Timisoara, Romania (500 miles and 2 international frontiers from its supposed destination). Perhaps, you could read ‘Geography For Dummies’ first.”

Very grown up. Anyone flying this weekend must feel reassured by this dumb-and-dumber routine being played out by flight operators responsible for thousands of lives.