Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has ordered the National Energy System Operator to “urgently investigate” the power outage caused by a substation fire that shut Heathrow Airport on Friday.
He is working with Ofgem and using powers under the Energy Act to formally launch the grid operator’s investigation.
“We are determined to properly understand what happened and what lessons need to be learned,” Miliband said.
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“That is why, working with Ofgem, I have today commissioned the National Energy System Operator to carry out an investigation into this specific incident and to understand any wider lessons to be learned on energy resilience for critical national infrastructure, both now and in the future.
“The Government is determined to do everything it can to prevent a repeat of what happened at Heathrow.”
The National Energy System Operator (Neso) is expected to report to the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and Ofgem with initial findings within six weeks.
Flights resumed at the west London airport on Friday evening and restrictions on overnight flights were temporarily lifted after hours of closure.
A blaze knocked out an electricity substation in Hayes the previous evening.
Counter-terrorism officers from the Metropolitan Police initially led the investigation, but the force has confirmed the fire is believed to be non-suspicious, so the London Fire Brigade is now leading the probe which will focus on the electrical distribution equipment.
Heathrow said it has added 50 slots to Saturday’s schedule to facilitate an extra 10,000 passengers travelling through the airport.
A spokesperson said: “We can confirm that Heathrow is open and fully operational today.
“Teams across the airport continue to do everything they can to support passengers impacted by yesterday’s outage at an off-airport power substation.
“We have hundreds of additional colleagues on hand in our terminals and we have added flights to today’s schedule to facilitate an extra 10,000 passengers travelling through the airport.
“Passengers travelling today should check with their airline for the latest information regarding their flight.”
The airport later added that all terminals and all car parks are open.
Heathrow ‘an embarrassment’ and a ‘laughing stock,’ say business leaders
Surinder Arora, founder and chairman of the Arora Group, has described the Heathrow shutdown as “an embarrassment for the whole nation”.
Mr Arora, who is a leading hotelier in the Heathrow area, told The Independent: “This matter has been an embarrassment for the whole nation and we welcome the chair of the Transport Select Committee [Ruth Cadbury MP] suggesting this will be a matter for her committee to launch an inquiry into.
“Given the number of serious questions that need to be answered, a full investigation must be held at the earliest opportunity and at the heart of that must be how Heathrow can be so reliant on any single site or source for power.
The sentiment was also expressed by Lord Toby Harris, who heads the National Preparedness Commission.
“It’s a huge embarrassment for the country that a fire in one electricity substation can have such a devastating effect,” he told Channel 4.
Jason Bona, owner of supply chain company PS Forwarding, told the Today programme the incident made Heathrow a “laughing stock” in the global freight community.
Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said: “This incident caused significant disruption but Heathrow, National Grid, and our emergency services have worked swiftly to get people travelling again.
“Heathrow is a massive airport that uses the energy of a small city, so it’s imperative we identify how this power failure happened and learn from this to ensure a vital piece of national infrastructure remains strong.
“Whilst Heathrow is back to business, some disruption is expected over coming days as things get back to normal so I encourage anyone travelling to check with their airlines and plan their journeys.”
Thousands of homes were left without power and more than 100 people were evacuated after a transformer within the North Hyde electrical substation near Heathrow caught fire (Photo credit: Matthew Muirhead via AP)Adding to the ongoing disruption at Heathrow, passengers face a diversion if travelling to the airport via the M25.
This also affects those driving to other locations, including Gatwick Airport, via the M25, as Junctions 10 and 11 in both directions will be closed on 21-24 March.
Work began at 9pm on 21 March and will be completed by 6am on 24 March.
Akshay Kaul, director general for infrastructure at Ofgem, said: “We saw yesterday the huge disruption that comes when energy supply is disrupted, and it’s important we now understand how that happened.
“Households and businesses should be able to have confidence in the resilience of critical national infrastructure, and Ofgem will work with the government and others to ensure Neso’s review goes as far as possible to ensuring steps are put in place to avoid any repeat of an incident of this scale in the future.
“To the extent the review finds any breaches of standards or licence obligations, we will not hesitate to take action.”
Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye welcomed the investigation, adding: “We will support every effort to understand the causes and impacts of yesterday’s off-airport incident and we are committed to working closely with all stakeholders to ensure a thorough investigation to help strengthen the airport’s future resilience.”
Mr Woldbye said a back-up transformer failed during the power outage, meaning systems had to be closed following safety procedures so that power supplies could be restructured from two remaining substations to restore enough electricity to power what is described as a “mid-sized city”.
He apologised to stranded passengers and defended the airport’s response to the situation, saying the incident is as “as big as it gets for our airport” and that “we cannot guard ourselves 100%”.
Thousands of homes were left without power and more than 100 people were evacuated after a transformer within the substation caught fire.
In a further blow to travellers, Heathrow Express has announced it will be out of action tomorrow morning for upgrade work.
A Heathrow Express spokesperson said: “A gentle reminder: Due to planned railway upgrade work, Heathrow Express will be running a reduced service on Sunday, 23 March, with no service before 9:12am.”
Heathrow is Europe’s largest airport, with more than 83.9 million passengers travelling through its terminals in 2024, and around 200,000 passengers have been affected by Friday’s closure.
This is believed to be the worst disruption at Heathrow since December 2010, when thousands of Christmas getaway passengers camped in the terminals because of widespread cancellations caused by snow.
In April of that year, air travel was grounded across Europe because of an ash cloud caused by an Icelandic volcanic eruption.
‘We could have been stuck in worse places’: Three friends extend French Alps trip after Heathrow chaos
by Steve Robson
Three friends stuck on a snowboarding trip in the French Alps because of the chaos at Heathrow say they have now been offered flights home on Monday.
James Phillpott, 50, Damian Cairns, 51, and Joe Mahony, 43, were supposed to be flying back on Friday night but their British Airways (BA) flight was cancelled.
James Phillpott, 50, Damian Cairns, 51, and Joe Mahony, 43, snowboarding in France (Photo: Supplied)They found out last night that the first available flight back with BA will be on Monday evening.
“We’re grateful we could have been stuck in worse places,” Mr Phillpott told The i Paper.
“We’ve just been out for another day’s snowboarding so it’s not all bad.
“We’ve had to carry on staying here.
“Luckily our company Riders Refuge have let us stay on so it hasn’t put us out too much.
“But it’s put our families out, we’ve got kids at home.
“I was supposed to be taking my father-in-law to a hospital appointment.”
The friends are concerned that BA has not confirmed whether they will be able to claim back any of the extra costs they’ve had in accommodation and food, which is likely to run to hundreds of pounds.
“All we’ve definitely had from BA is ‘we’ve moved your flight’,” said Mr Phillpott.
Additional reporting by agencies
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