Planes begin to land at airport but airlines said the closure would continue to have a ‘huge impact’ on passengers in the coming days
British Airways (BA) said it expects to operate about 85% of its scheduled flights at Heathrow airport on Saturday, as it recovers from a lengthy closure of the travel hub after a substation fire, reports the PA news agency.
The airline would usually expect to run nearly 600 departures and arrivals on Saturday but it is understood cancellations will be made, where possible, to high-frequency routes.
We are planning to operate as many flights as possible to and from Heathrow on Saturday, but to recover an operation of our size after such a significant incident is extremely complex.
We expect around 85% of our Saturday Heathrow schedule to run, but it is likely that all travelling customers will experience delays as we continue to navigate the challenges posed by Friday’s power outage at the airport.
They have stood up their resilience plan swiftly, and they’ve collaborated closely with our emergency responders and the airline operators. They do have backup energy supplies, they have generators, diesel generators.
None of that failed on this occasion because that backup supply is designed to protect the critical key systems within the airport and not to provide power to the whole airport.
Continue reading…
Source link : https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2025/mar/22/heathrow-airport-closure-fire-reopens-london-travel-flight-information-latest-news-updates
Author : Amy Sedghi (now) and Hamish Mackay (earlier)
Publish date : 2025-03-22 08:06:00
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.