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Original poster

Heathrow Airport is shut until Friday night

489 replies

Ozgirl76 · 21/03/2025 03:24

And my husband is due to fly home to Australia on Friday evening. I predict chaos.
Airport is saying that people should not travel to Heathrow and should contact their airlines.

OP posts:
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6
quantumbutterfly · 22/03/2025 07:53

FreedomandPeace · 22/03/2025 04:42

Its a shame it’s not Christmas…all those Brussels sprouts would do a great job

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Ah but we're trying to reduce toxic emissions.

We'd have to integrate carbon capture into the process. I've been wondering about turning my carbon into diamonds when I shuffle off my mortal coil, I think I would make nice Christmas decorations, but I suspect that might take a few brassicas to generate the energy to achieve

pearlsofcats · 22/03/2025 08:10

quantumbutterfly · 22/03/2025 07:53

Ah but we're trying to reduce toxic emissions.

We'd have to integrate carbon capture into the process. I've been wondering about turning my carbon into diamonds when I shuffle off my mortal coil, I think I would make nice Christmas decorations, but I suspect that might take a few brassicas to generate the energy to achieve

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How about a crystal disco ball instead?
That might be nice and would cheer everyone up.

quantumbutterfly · 22/03/2025 08:22

pearlsofcats · 22/03/2025 08:10

How about a crystal disco ball instead?
That might be nice and would cheer everyone up.

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That's a cracking idea, apparently you can use hair and I have a bit to spare, I could make a start now.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about these subjects:

Flying Holidays
kiwiblue · 22/03/2025 10:54

wondabar · 21/03/2025 22:40

@kiwibluewe were advised today by BA that we wouldn’t be compensated if we arranged flights via different routes with different airlines. Has your husband arranged the new flights on his own or with the agreement of the airline? It could become quite expensive if not covered by them.

Ah thanks for the heads up. He's on a work trip so he won't have paid for it. BA were pretty unhelpful!

ByLemonSwan · 22/03/2025 22:56

JustMyView13 · 21/03/2025 06:35

It amazes me how airlines like BA don’t have emergency protocol in this situation. I’ve got a relative due to fly out around 11am today & all they have is an email saying there’s an issue and they’ll know more soon,
If the airport is closed all day, surely it makes sense to cancel the flight and trigger a rebooking link. Instead you just end up in limbo land, I know their IT is rubbish but we have the technology available for this stuff to be automated.

What emergency protocol? Rescheduling flights is bread and butter for any airline. That's the protocol.

I was due to fly with BA yesterday to Amsterdam. Considering this happened at 3am, DH and I left just after this time to drive to Heathrow for our 0645 flight. We were greeted with a closed T5 park and ride and lack of any information. Until a fellow passenger showed us the website. BA didn't reschedule me until 07:10, as per the text. So think about how many flights leave and come into Heathrow on BA alone. Then let's not forget the code sharing airlines in the One World Alliance and also trying to get those coming back on alternative flights and the whole logistics of it for an unforeseen event.

Straycats · 23/03/2025 06:02

crowstreet · 21/03/2025 08:07

Of course it’s Russia, and the timing isn’t a coincidence. Last time there were big fires in Latvia, Germany and Poland, explosives on cargo planes, etc., everything indicated those were acts of sabotage by the peace-loving Russia.

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Honestly?
it was upper management to go Net Zero and get rid of the diesel generators and have one yes one electric one used that caused all this carnage.

Thisiswhathings · 23/03/2025 06:18

Heathrow still has some diesel generators, they were all working fine.

JustMyView13 · 23/03/2025 06:22

ByLemonSwan · 22/03/2025 22:56

What emergency protocol? Rescheduling flights is bread and butter for any airline. That's the protocol.

I was due to fly with BA yesterday to Amsterdam. Considering this happened at 3am, DH and I left just after this time to drive to Heathrow for our 0645 flight. We were greeted with a closed T5 park and ride and lack of any information. Until a fellow passenger showed us the website. BA didn't reschedule me until 07:10, as per the text. So think about how many flights leave and come into Heathrow on BA alone. Then let's not forget the code sharing airlines in the One World Alliance and also trying to get those coming back on alternative flights and the whole logistics of it for an unforeseen event.

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I can’t work out if you’re agreeing with me, that they should have systems and processes in place to deal with emergency situations. Or if you’re impressed with the service.

Took several hours of calls to get a flight switched in the end. BA said the flight was still going ahead just a little delayed. Which was a direct contradiction of the airport closure. Thankfully relative declined the offer of keeping their current flight and are going today instead. They got a text 30mins later to say their original flight was cancelled (of course it was, only BA seemed confused on that point!?)

Sennelier1 · 23/03/2025 09:03

When we travel we sometimes drive, sometimes fly, sometimes take Thalyss or Eurostar. One of our children lives abroad. There's always a lot of stress about strikes. We seriously consider in the future to only travel by car. We're in Belgium.

JulesJules · 23/03/2025 09:08

pearlsofcats · 21/03/2025 13:28

I’m watching with interest from Scandinavia. So glad my prepping includes popcorn, I will be making some. 🍿

If you’ve got some time over I recommend you all to read the latest In case of crises or war brochure that was recently sent to all households here. Just in case.

rib.msb.se/filer/pdf/30874.pdf

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I read the booklet, full of excellent advice - what stood out for me was suggesting hot drinks to stockpile - coffee, tea, hot chocolate and blueberry and rosehip soup

pearlsofcats · 23/03/2025 09:12

JulesJules · 23/03/2025 09:08

I read the booklet, full of excellent advice - what stood out for me was suggesting hot drinks to stockpile - coffee, tea, hot chocolate and blueberry and rosehip soup

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Ah yes, those two are common hot drinks here during winter.

Heylittlesongbird · 23/03/2025 12:08

I was an early worrier on page 1 about a Saturday flight. Just wanted to report back that everything went exactly as it should.

Hats off to the airline industry for getting back on track so quickly after power was restored.

notimagain · 23/03/2025 12:54

Heylittlesongbird · 23/03/2025 12:08

I was an early worrier on page 1 about a Saturday flight. Just wanted to report back that everything went exactly as it should.

Hats off to the airline industry for getting back on track so quickly after power was restored.

Glad it worked out.

From what I’ve heard it sounds like the recovery plan pretty much worked as it should have done but unfortunately even given the hard work mainly behind the scenes many people who were actually caught up in the disruption itself on Friday will still be disrupted…

The way this usually works post disruption is once the operation starts up again the airlines try to fly as many people as possible on their original bookings, so in this case you’d expect those booked on Saturday to fly Saturday.

Those who lost out on Friday will have to be slotted in where there are spare seats or booked on different routes. Sounds callous but that strategy reduces the total number of people who have their travel plans disrupted.

If there any good fortune at all in this it was that by the time the power cut stopped operations at Heathrow late Thursday night almost all the shorthaul inbound flights due to nightstop for an early departure Friday had landed, they hadn’t diverted. That meant the airlines had aircraft and crew well placed to start shorthaul ops Sat AM after a day’s pause.

Longhaul was a bit different because of the early Friday AM diversions of aircraft en-route overnight. Even so by Fri night some airlines were able to get aircraft back into Heathrow and BA even managed to get some Longhaul outbound flights out close to schedule late Friday.

snowmichael · 25/03/2025 16:27

notimagain · 21/03/2025 15:22

@snowmichael

As you've probably seen, they did
The tower has its own generator, but the lights and radar are all taken down

Not sure that’s correct TBH..certainly at airports such at Heathrow that are equipped to support approaches in very low visibility there’s a regulatory requirement for quite a few of the airfield functions (e.g. some runway lighting, the Instrument Landing system, plus some other equipment, not sure about radar ) to have fast acting, fast switching back up power to cater for “the mains” going whilst an aircraft is on an approach.

As I understand it, happy to be corrected, ATC won’t run/operate on the back up for an extended period, it’s more a case of using it to get aircraft that are on approach on to the ground and facilitate the diversion of those other aircraft inbound who can do so.

I agree with pretty much all of that
But the overhead shots showed the apron lights all out, and at least one showed no runway lights as well

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