19Recitals 14 and 15 and Article 5(3) of that regulation, as interpreted by the Court, state that an air carrier is to be released from its obligation to pay passengers compensation under Article 7 of Regulation No 261/2004 if the carrier can prove that the cancellation or delay of three hours or more is caused by ‘extraordinary circumstances’ which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken (see judgment of 4 May 2017, Pešková and Peška, C‑315/15, EU:C:2017:342, paragraph 20 and the case-law cited) and, where such circumstances do arise, that it adopted measures appropriate to the situation, deploying all its resources in terms of staff or equipment and the financial means at its disposal in order to avoid that situation from resulting in the cancellation or long delay of the flight in question, without the air carrier being required to make intolerable sacrifices in the light of the capacities of its undertaking at the relevant time (see, to that effect, judgment of 4 May 2017, Pešková and Peška, C‑315/15, EU:C:2017:342, paragraphs 29 and 34).
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