Britain’s Heathrow Airport was closed all day yesterday after a fire at a nearby electrical substation knocked out its power, disrupting flights for hundreds of thousands of passengers at United Kingdom’s busiest travel hub.
Flight tracking service FlightRadar 24 said at least 1,350 flights to and from Heathrow were affected, and the impact was likely to last several days as passengers tried to reschedule their travel.
Some 120 flights were in the air when the closure was announced, with some turned around and others diverted to Gatwick Airport outside London, Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris or Ireland’s Shannon Airport, tracking services showed.
Counter-terrorism police are leading the investigation into the fire, but the Met Police said there’s currently no indication of foul play.
Heathrow said no planes would fly yesterday and warned of days of disruption.
A source from the airport said back-up generators did spring into action, but they weren’t enough to power the whole airport – an air industry boss said it left “serious questions”.
Hotels and pubs near the airport were packed with stranded passengers desperate for news, the BBC reported.
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