Heathrow live: Airport orders investigation into crisis management plans amid ‘laughing stock’ criticism – UK Times

Writing in his column The Man Who Pays His Way this morning, travel correspondent Simon Calder warns of the reputational damage to Heathrow airport – and the wider UK – could be long lasting.

Each of the quarter-million passengers whose travel plans were wrecked by the sudden closure of Heathrow airport on Friday simply wanted to reach the destination on their ticket. There was no good way to learn that wasn’t going to happen due to a fire in an electricity substation that had cut power to Europe’s busiest airport.

Beyond the personal stories of upset, the airlines are seething. The collective financial hit from lost revenue, care costs and the expense of retrieving aircraft from the many and various locations where they landed in a hurry on Friday morning is, I estimate conservatively, £100m. More than half of that loss will be sustained by British Airways.

Read the full analysis here from our travel correspondent Simon Calder:

A Heathrow spokesperson said the airport is expecting to operate a “full schedule of over 1,300 flights” on Sunday, following the power outage that shut the airport on Friday.

A statement said: “Today we will operate another full schedule of over 1,300 flights.

“We apologise for the inconvenience caused by our decision to close the airport on Friday following a significant fire at an off-site power sub station.

“Yesterday, we served more than 250,000 passengers, with punctual flights and almost all passengers waiting less than five minutes for security.

“We have welcomed the Government’s announcement of an investigation into the cause and response to the off-airport power outage and have launched a review, to be chaired by former Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly, of Heathrow’s response. While these inquiries are ongoing, our focus remains on serving our passengers.”

Heathrow Airport on Friday experienced a complete shutdown due to a severe fire, disrupting hundreds of thousands of passengers.

Airlines are obligated to provide care for stranded passengers, including meals and accommodations, but are not required to offer compensation as the fire was beyond their control, writes Simon Calder.

Economist Stephen Rooney said: “In terms of what’s at stake, at the conservative end, we estimate a potential loss of tourism revenue amounting to £4.8m per day.

“We can estimate this loss based on typical inbound arrivals volumes that come to the UK through Heathrow and the average daily spend of those travelling.”

He said his estimates did not include the potential loss of earnings of airport and airline staff, lost income for airport retail and ancillary services such as airport taxis.

Insurance payouts, lost money for affected passengers and other costs to airlines involved would further inflate the damage.

“It has been absolutely insane”, Amber Roden, a US citizen getting married in three days’ time told Reuters, after a number of her relatives had their flights cancelled.

Two relatives who were halfway to London from Atlanta had to turn around and go back, she told the news agency, while two others will not make it to the UK until the day of the wedding, which she has been planning for two years.

The National Energy System Operator (Neso) is expected to report to the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and Ofgem with initial findings of the investigation into power outage at the Heathrow airport within six weeks.

Akshay Kaul, director general for infrastructure at Ofgem, said it would “not hesitate to take action” if the review found any breaches of standards or licence obligations”.

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,” he added.

Several passengers travelling to Heathrow from London’s Paddington Station were still nervous, the Reuters news agency reports.

“I’m just hoping that when I get there, I can actually go,” said university professor Melissa Graboyes, who said she was repeatedly checking the status of her flight to Toronto.

An investigation into the power outage caused by a substation fire that shut Heathrow has been ordered after about 200,000 passengers were affected by the airport’s closure.

Energy secretary Ed Miliband has ordered the National Energy System Operator to “urgently investigate” the power outage caused by a substation fire, and is working with Ofgem and using powers under the Energy Act to formally launch the grid operator’s investigation.

Meanwhile, an internal review of the airport’s crisis management plans and its response to Friday’s power outage will be undertaken by former transport secretary Ruth Kelly, who is an independent member of Heathrow’s board, Heathrow chairman Lord Paul Deighton said.

As he ordered the investigation on Saturday, Mr Miliband said: “We are determined to properly understand what happened and what lessons need to be learned.

“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.”

Ministers have ordered an urgent probe into the substation fire which forced Heathrow airport to close for 15 hours on Friday – as experts warned the remarkable meltdown had “embarrassed” Britain on the global stage.

The travel plans of up to 300,000 passengers were cast into disarray on Friday after the blaze at a single west London substation grounded more than 1,300 flights between Europe’s busiest airport and locations across the globe.

While the airport declared itself “fully operational” once again on Saturday – with hundreds of extra airport staff rallied to facilitate an additional 10,000 passengers travelling through Heathrow – more than 100 flights were cancelled, including those travelling to New York and arriving from Dubai. Heathrow would typically expect to facilitate 600 flights on Saturday.

Read our full report on Saturday’s developments here: