Police removed more than 100 passengers from a Ryanair plane preparing to leave the Canary Islands after a large scuffle broke out onboard.

La Provincia, a Spanish newspaper, said the disruption happened when budget airline Ryanair tried to charge one passenger extra for carry-on baggage. His friends aboard the plane “mutinied”.

A Spanish interior ministry spokesman said the pilot was preparing for take-off at Guacimeta airport on the Lanzarote island resort for Charleroi, Belgium, when she radioed for police assistance.

He said that, of the 168 passengers, only 66 were allowed to re-board yesterday’s flight. The rest had to find other carriers and some spent the night on Lanzarote.

In a statement, Ryanair denied there had been a “mutiny” on the plane, saying it had been forced to offload a group of 100 passengers at the request of Spanish police.

“This group became disruptive, and refused to comply with crew instructions after a number of their group were required to pay a gate bag fee for outsized luggage,” the airline said.

“Lanzarote police required the entire aircraft be offloaded, each passenger identified. Following further disruptive behaviour, the police required for security reasons that this enitre group be refused travel,” it added.

The airline apologised to the 66 remaining passengers who suffered a three-hour delay while Ryanair and the local police were dealing with incident.