Heathrow Airport fire: When will the London airport reopen after fire that destroyed electrical substation?
Heathrow Airport is closed for the day after a fire in a nearby electrical substation knocked out power to the area.
The fire took hold at about 11.20pm last night, and as well as taking out power to about 100,000 homes overnight - with about 4,000 still out this morning - the electrical supply to the airport went down. More than 100 people were evacuated and nearby residents who weren’t were told to keep their windows shut.
Today more than 200,000 air passengers have had their flights to or from Heathrow cancelled because the airport is closed.
The airport has said that it will be closed until 11.59pm today - so effectively for all of Friday. The knock-on effects of the closure are likely to be felt for days as plane schedules will be disrupted.
A Heathrow spokesperson said: “Heathrow is experiencing a significant power outage across the airport due to a large fire at a nearby electrical substation. Whilst fire crews are responding to the incident, we do not have clarity on when power may be reliably restored.
“To maintain the safety of our passengers and colleagues, we have no choice but to close Heathrow until 11.59pm on March 21. We expect significant disruption over the coming days and passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until the airport reopens.
“We will provide an update when more information on the resumption of operations is available. We know this will be disappointing for passengers and we want to reassure that we are working as hard as possible to resolve the situation.”
It is unclear how quickly flights will resume at Heathrow once it reopens.
The government restricts the number of flights that are allowed to take off or land at the airport between 11.30pm and 6am each day.
The airport’s website states: “Sometimes planes need to operate in the night period when they have not been scheduled to do so. This could be for a number of reasons such as delays that have built up during the day or for a technical fault with an aircraft that needs to be repaired. There is always a delicate balance to be struck as to whether a flight should be allowed at night, considering the effects on local communities, passengers and the airline network.”