Heathrow said its teams had worked tirelessly to reopen the world’s fifth-busiest airport after it was forced to close entirely on Friday after a huge fire engulfed a substation near the airport on Thursday night, with travellers told to stay away.
After power was restored to the airport this afternoon, Heathrow said that it was “safely able to restart flights, prioritising repatriation and relocation of aircraft”.
Thomas Woldbye, the airport’s CEO, apologised to passengers but said that there were “contingencies of certain sizes we cannot guard ourselves against 100 per cent”.
The fire at North Hyde Electricity Substation in Haye, which transmitted power to Heathrow(Photo: London Fire Brigade)However, Sean Doyle, the chairman of British Airways, said that the chaos would have “a substantial impact on our airline and customers for many days to come, with disruption to journeys expected over the coming days”.
BA operates the largest share of flights from the airport at 51 per cent, followed by Virgin Atlantic and Lufthansa.
Aviation consultant John Strickland likened the disruption to what happened after the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001, when flights were grounded across the US, saying: “It’s a contained version of 9/11.”
A British Airways on the runway after landing as authorities announced a partial resumption of flights (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)BA cancelled 670 flights carrying around 107,000 customers on Friday- with similar numbers of passengers booked to travel over the weekend.
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“You would think they would have significant back-up power,” one top executive from a European airline told Reuters.
However, the Metropolitan Police and the London Fire Brigade said they were not treating the fire as suspicious, although inquiries continue.
London Fire Brigade (LFB) received the first reports of the fire at 11.23pm on Thursday.
Electrical substation fire near Heathrow Airport (Photo: PA Graphics / PA Wire)
As the scale of the outage became clear, airlines including jetBlue, American Airlines, Air Canada, Air India, Delta Air Lines, Qantas, United Airlines, BA and Virgin were diverted or returned to their origin airports in the middle of the night, according to data from flight analytics firm Cirium.
Some airlines such as United Airlines and Air Canada said they expected flights to be able to depart for Heathrow late last night, to arrive this morning, and eight long-haul BA flights were set to take off from Heathrow last night.
Following that initial confirmation from the Met, the LFB announced its investigation will focus on the electrical distribution equipment.
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Downing Street said it “wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect checks on resilience” are being carried out at other major airports.
However, the systems are not designed to run a “full operation” which is why the airport had to close, the source added.
“Fires at electrical substations can be caused by the breakdown in insulation between high voltage electrical equipment in the substation and/or overheating, usually due to an equipment failure,” he said.
Missed family events
Travellers stranded by the Heathrow shutdown have missed out on time with loved ones, work events and the chance to spend Ramadan with family.
“If they can confirm to me I’m flying out tomorrow, I’ll get a hotel somewhere in London. But if they don’t say anything, then I kind of just have to go home,” he said.
“We only see each other two weeks, four times a year. But we’re trying really hard to stay positive,” she said.
Hotels accused of ‘price gouging’ during emergency
Hotels have been accused of price-gouging during the emergency situation at Heathrow.
With the airport closed unexpectedly lots of people are stranded and need to stay in a hotel overnight while they wait to see if their flight will be rescheduled.
The Holiday Inn is charging more than £500 for a room tonight. The same room next Friday is only £87.
A search on booking.com shows Radisson Red at Heathrow is charging £555 for a room tonight. The same room next Friday is only £132 for the night.
Airlines have also been accused of engaging in “opportunistic” flight pricing.
Ryanair launched eight extra “rescue” flights between Stansted and Dublin which went on sale at 9.30am on Friday morning.
However, passengers complained the airline was charging more than €300 for a one-way flight.
On Friday afternoon British Airways was offering a flight to Shannon for £429 – the same flight a week later was £113.
easyJet customer Dr Ashleigh Wiseman said the flight she was attempting to book from Gatwick to Zurich increased by £140 on Friday morning as the Heathrow crisis was unfolding.
Train companies such as Northern, LNER and TransPennine Express said they would allow passengers diverted to other UK airports from Heathrow to travel on their services for free.
An easyJet spokesperson said: “easyJet’s pricing is demand led and demand for flights today has been very high as a result of the Heathrow closure. We do not artificially raise fares.”
IHG, Radisson, Eurostar, BA and Ryanair were contacted for comment.
One local, known only as Lydia, told The i Paper that her disabled brother is living in supported accommodation in Hayes with “no power”, meaning his medical equipment is not working.
Travellers are waiting as Britain’s Heathrow Airport has closed for the full day Friday after an electrical substation fire knocked out its power (Photo: AP/Kin Cheung)
“They’ve got no power, there’s an alarm going off and they can’t cut it off… His medical equipment isn’t working.
“He’s on the first floor with another wheelchair user and there’s no lift.
Hillingdon Council confirmed it had to evacuate around 150 people last night due to the fire and while most have been able to stay elsewhere, around a dozen are being put up in hotels tonight.
The North Hyde electrical substation which caught fire last night (Photo: Jonathan Brady/PA)
A total of 67,000 households were left without power 150 people were evacuated to a rest centre.
It said the fire involved a transformer comprising of 25,000 litres of cooling oil which was set fully alight, creating a “major hazard” due to the still live high voltage equipment and the nature of an oil-fuelled fire.
The Metropolitan Police declared a major incident at 12.42am.
The Fire Bridage said the incident remains “very visible and significant”, with firefighters working tirelessly in hazardous conditions overnight to bring the fire under control.
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