"It has spoiled our holiday but we will get on with it," said Mr Law, 81, from Hayes in Kent, who had been looking forward to a fortnight in Italy with his wife Edna, where they will spend Christmas with their daughter.
Describing their sleepless night, Mrs Law, 73, said: "It was freezing cold and seemed to get colder as the night when on. Everyone was spread around the floor trying to get some sleep.
"I feel sorry about what happened. It was a dreadful accident but everything is so disorganised in every respect."
Mrs Law said their original Ryanair flight had been scheduled for 5.35pm on Wednesday but had been delayed for more than an hour because of a problem unrelated to the crash.
Almost a day later they were still awaiting departure news from the airport's busy Tannoy speakers which would prompt their move to the airport's check-in queues - an impenetrable mass of forlorn passengers.
The airport's single runway was closed for almost 16 hours and reopened at 11am yesterday.
While the tailbacks on the roads around Stansted had cleared by yesterday morning, the airport, which had already been expecting its busiest day of the year, was struggling to deal with a long backlog of flights to European and British destinations.
William Curran, 38, a psychologist from London, was also angry with Ryanair.
Mr Curran, planning to visit family in Northern Ireland, had arrived at the airport at 5am yesterday but was sent to Luton airport, where he was told his rescheduled flight had left from Gatwick. He had returned to Stansted where he was awaiting another flight.
Ryanair said it was doing its best under difficult circumstances.
The chaos at Stansted came as 1.5m travellers thronged to air and sea ports to spend the holiday abroad.
Most airports are experiencing a record Christmas. Roads, though, remained quiet, with the AA and the RAC predicting serious congestion beginning later today.
Ferry company Stena Line reported heavy bookings on its Harwich to the Hook of Holland service and Wales to Ireland service between Holyhead and Dun Laoghaire.
The RAC described roads yesterday as "remarkably quiet".
