Passengers on board a Jetstar flight from Hobart to Sydney have instead found themselves stuck at Canberra Airport in the early hours of this morning after their flight was diverted.

The 177 people on board Jetstar's Airbus A320-232 flight JQ724 were due to depart Hobart at 8:10pm and arrive in Sydney last night at 9.55pm, but turned with about 150 kilometres still to go — landing in Canberra around 10:30pm, where they were kept on the plane until midnight.

At 11:00am today, passengers boarded a bus for the three-hour bus journey to their intended destination.

One man who said he was on the aircraft told the ABC people on board were told "we don't have enough fuel" to wait for the backlog of planes to land.

"The pilot said due to bad weather there's a lot of air traffic in Sydney and planes are waiting and basically flying around the airport and we don't have enough fuel," Javad Ziaolhagh said.

Once the plane landed in Canberra, Mr Ziaolhagh said passengers were kept on board.

"They were hesitating to accept us, they had to do a lot of paperwork so we could actually get out of the plane," he said, adding it was announced over the intercom Canberra Airport "don't have enough staff for 200 people to come in".

Eventually, passengers entered the Canberra terminal around midnight and were later bussed to hotels around the city, without their luggage which would be in Sydney, they were told.

Mr Ziaolhagh said he was frustrated the "same plane" would today fly to Sydney and "has to leave empty which is so stupid and a waste of fuel".

In a statement, Jetstar told the ABC:

Following Sydney air traffic control's instructions due to strong winds, a flight from Hobart to Sydney yesterday diverted to Canberra.

Following Sydney air traffic control's instructions due to strong winds, a flight from Hobart to Sydney yesterday diverted to Canberra. Our captain diverted to Canberra where weather conditions were better and landed the plane normally.

Our captain diverted to Canberra where weather conditions were better and landed the plane normally. All customers were provided hotel accommodation in Canberra and buses were arranged to transport everyone to Sydney the next morning.

All customers were provided hotel accommodation in Canberra and buses were arranged to transport everyone to Sydney the next morning. Safety is our highest priority and we apologise to customers for this disruption.

'Like some crazy movie'

Fellow passenger, Hobart videographer Jake Percey, said he was only planning to be in Sydney for two days' work and decided not to wait for Jetstar to get him there.

"I'd heard the bus leaving for Canberra was going to be 11:00am and I knew that wasn't going to work out," he said.

"They were doing alphabetical order for sorting hotel rooms, so being the letter P, I had time to look through my phone and work out what I could do to get to Sydney."

He said he caught a taxi to a bus that was leaving Canberra for Sydney at 4:00am.

Mr Percey described the whole experience as unnerving.

"There was just a whole uncertainty about the situation with Jetstar and what they were doing. It felt like I was in some crazy movie the whole time."

He said he'll seek compensation not only for the bus ticket, but for last night's accommodation in Sydney.