Fires shut down Heathrow Airport in England, destroying hundreds of flights

Heathrow Airport in the UK said a fire broke out on the extinction of electricity at a nearby substation, destroying flight schedules around the world, which will be closed on Friday.

The London Fire Brigade said about 70 firefighters were in the fire in western London, which was the busiest in Europe and the world’s busiest airport, Heathrow, caused a massive power outage.

The night before firefighters said they were under control of the fire, huge orange flames and black smoke could be seen shooting in the sky. By the early morning, the roads around the UK’s largest airport were largely abandoned, except for some passengers walking away from their luggage.
“Our fire investigators will begin investigations and we will continue to work closely with our partners to minimize
Destroy and support the community,” the fire brigade said.
It said the cause of the fire is not yet clear. Energy Minister Ed Miliband said it did not seem like a foul.

Heathrow Airport said the airport will handle 1,351 flights during the day and can fly up to 291,000 passengers
It was closed until midnight as it was experiencing a lot of power outages. According to Flight Trucking website Flighttradar24, at least 120 inbound flights to Heathrow Airport had to be transferred to other airports.

“Cross passengers are advised not to go to the airport and should contact their airline for more information,” Heathrow said. “We apologize for the inconvenience.”

Fire forced the plane to move to UK airports after 11pm local time on Thursday
and Europe, although many long-haul flights are just back to their departure points.
Miliband said the “disastrous” fires prevented the work of the backup system and engineers are working to deploy a third backup mechanism.
“With any such incident, we will want to understand why this happens and any courses it provides for our infrastructure,” he told Sky News.

Airplanes are transferred around the world

Industry experts say tourism, travel and trade will be further disrupted worldwide, as flights will be cancelled or delayed due to the absence of the plane.

“Heathrow is one of the world’s major hubs,” said Ian Petchenik, spokesman for flight tracking site Flightradar24. “This will disrupt airline operations around the world.”

British Airways itself plans to land 341 flights at Heathrow Airport on Friday.

It said: “This will obviously have a significant impact on our operations and our customers and we are working as soon as possible to update their travel options for the next 24 hours and beyond.”

The fire forced the planes to move around the world.

Qantas flights from Perth to Paris, New York United Airlines to Ireland and a United Airlines flight from San Francisco will take off in Washington, D.C., instead of London.

Some flights from the United States are spinning in the air, returning to their departure point.

“Heathrow is one of the world’s major hubs,” said Flightradar24 spokesman Ian Petchenik. “This will disrupt airline operations around the world.”

Airline chaos forecasts for the next few days

Travel experts say the interference will go far beyond Heathrow Airport

The carefully orchestrated network of airlines depends on the aircraft that is at a specific location at a certain time. Dozens of airlines will have to rush to reconfigure their networks to move aircraft and crew.

“The other question is, ‘How will airlines deal with the backlog of passengers?’,” said tourism analyst Henry Harteveldt in the atmospheric research team. “It will be a few days of chaos.”

Some passengers turned to social media. Adrian Spender, who works for Tesco, UK, said in an article on X that he was on the Airbus A380, which had travelled to Heathrow Airport.

Aircraft transfer

” #heathrow doesn’t know where we are going. Currently in Austria.”

Heathrow and other major airports in London have been hitting power in recent years, most recently in 2023 with automated door failures and air traffic system crashes.

A Heathrow Airport spokesman told Reuters in an email that it is not clear when power will be restored and they expect significant damage in the next few days.

On the grounds of London, many houses and businesses have no power. “Firefighters have caused 29 people to be safe from the neighboring property, and for preventive measures, a 200-meter cordon has been established and about 150 people have been evacuated.”