Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye has admitted he was shocked by the “unprecedented” fire and said he would look at the “resilience” of Europe’s busiest airport.
He told the BBC’s Today programme: “The incident yesterday was major it was no small thing. It takes time to reset the airport. “But remember hospitals and homes and other areas went down.
“We have three substations that power different sections of the airport. But when one goes down entirely, which is unprecedented and we have to live with the consequences.
“The airport shut not for days, but for hours because we had to reroute our power supply that requires taking down systems and powering them up again.
“We will learn from this and will ask do we need another level of resilience if we can’t trust the grid around us is working the way it should.”
Barney Davis22 March 2025 08:42
Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye told the BBC’s Today programme: “We are sincerely sorry for the inconvenience that passengers have experienced.”
He said the power substation that caught fire was not part of Heathrow’s infrastructure.
“All our backup systems were up and running, our tower was running but our systems are not designed to power the entire airport. We would need a seperate standby powerplant on site and we don’t have that.
“Heathrow uses as much energy as a city every day. We don’t have backup power for fuel systems, bridges and so on.”
He added: “Everything comes to a standstill when we need to reset as we did yesterday.”
Heathrow Airport CEO Thomas Woldbye apologised to passengers (PA) (PA Wire)
Barney Davis22 March 2025 08:31
Asked about reports disruptions could bleed into next week, Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye told the BBC’s Today programme: “There are no disruptions to airport operations.
“Airlines, ofcourse, have tales of stranded passengers who need repatriation and so on and they will handle that.
“But the airport itself is running as normal.”
Barney Davis22 March 2025 08:25
Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye has told the BBC’s Today programme in an update on Saturday morning: “We don’t expect any major flights to be delayed we are operating as normal.
“On any busy day, as today is, not just because of yesterday there are some cancellations and delays and we are handling them as we normaly do.”
Barney Davis22 March 2025 08:22
An American tourist has praised his airline’s and Heathrow’s “fantastic” response to a fire that closed the transport hub on Friday.
Speaking at Heathrow, Tim Kolb, who travelled to the UK on holiday from Dallas, Texas, he said: “I was just getting ready to board the plane on Thursday night, and the news actually started coming across on our phones quicker than on the (airport) desk.
“But American Airlines did a fabulous job – we didn’t have to wait in the line or anything. They got us our accommodation reservation.”
Mr Kolb, 55, added: “I thought I was going to be there delayed two days, but I went over yesterday.
“It was organised well. In fact, they had several planes leaving within an hour of each other to Heathrow.
“The way everybody responded and fell into action, it was fantastic.”
(AP)
Barney Davis22 March 2025 08:14
With planes departing from London Heathrow expected to be packed, airlines have been told by the airport management to expect long security queues.
After around 120,000 outbound passengers were unable to depart on Friday, every seat on every aircraft is likely to be filled.
On average in normal times, one in five seats is empty.
The 6am Operational Update said: “Our three key recovery objectives are: maintaining a safe and secure operation, managing residual risks, and transitioning back to business as usual.
“Operationally, all tunnels and terminals are open, with additional resources in place to handle any issues.
“Security is expected to be challenging, but manageable. One-stop security has been postponed for today.
“Minor issues with baggage systems in Terminal 2 are being monitored.
“There are also incorrect automated announcements by London Underground and National Highways signage claiming Heathrow is closed. This is being rectified.”
(Supplied)
Simon Calder22 March 2025 08:01
After more than 1,300 flights were grounded at London Heathrow, around 100 more have been axed by airlines whose flight crew and aircraft are out of position.
British Airways has cancelled almost 80 flights on Saturday after almost its entire schedule was grounded on Friday.
At least 20 long-haul inbound flights are cancelled, including four from New York JFK. Six outbound flights – to Boston, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Dubai and Riyadh – have been grounded.
Travellers arrives at Terminal 5 as Heathrow Airport slowly resumes flights after a fire cut power to Europe’s busiest airport in London (AP)
Twenty BA short-haul flights serving domestic and European destinations have been grounded.
Virgin Atlantic has cancelled six inbound arrivals after the outbound flights could not operate on Friday, and the morning flight to Montego Bay in Jamaica.
Other long-haul cancellations today include one Singapore Airlines flight, WestJet to Calgary and two flights to Delhi – one on Air Canada, the other on Air India.
Turkish Airlines and Brussels Airlines have also cancelled flights to their hubs, Istanbul and Brussels.
Simon Calder22 March 2025 07:50
A spokesperson for Heathrow said early this morning that the airport was “open and fully operational”, adding: “Teams across the airport continue to do everything they can to support passengers impacted by yesterday’s outage at an off-airport power substation.
Travellers arrive at Terminal 5 as Heathrow Airport slowly resumes flights after a fire cut power to Europe’s busiest airport in London, Saturday, 22 March 2025 (AP)
“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.”
Namita Singh22 March 2025 07:29
Flights have begun landing at Heathrow as it aims to return to normal operation today after the airport was shut over a loss of power, with restrictions on overnight flights temporarily lifted.
Flights resumed at the west London airport yesterday evening following hours of closure after a blaze knocked out an electricity substation in Hayes late on Thursday evening.
Passenger aircraft operated by British Airways on the tarmac at London Heathrow Airport on 21 March 2025 in London (Getty Images)
Heathrow Airport’s chief executive Thomas Woldbye told reporters on Friday afternoon: “We expect to be back in full operation (tomorrow), so 100 per cent operation as a normal day.
“(Passengers) should come to the airport as they normally would. There’s no reason to come earlier.”
According to flight tracking website FlightRadar24, British Airways (BA) flight BA56 from Johannesburg, South Africa was the first regular passenger flight to land at Heathrow since Thursday evening, touching down at 4.37am.
BA, which has a major presence at Heathrow, said it expects to operate around 85 per cent of its scheduled flights at the airport on Saturday.
Namita Singh22 March 2025 07:09
Restrictions on overnight flights were temporarily lifted to help ease congestion, the Department of Transport said.
According to Heathrow’s website, there is no formal ban on night flights but since the 1960s, the government has placed restrictions on them.
In this photo taken from video provided by Matthew Muirhead, a fire is seen at the North Hyde electrical substation near the Heathrow Airport in London, early Friday, 21 March 2025 (AP)
There is an annual limit of 5,800 night-time take-offs and landings between the hours of 11.30pm and 6am as well as a nightly limit, which caps the amount of noise the airport can make at night.
Namita Singh22 March 2025 06:48
