One of the world’s busiest airports is shut for an unprecedented full working day, disrupting air travel worldwide, after a major fire took out not only its power supply but backup systems as well.
Serious questions were immediately raised about the resilience of critical national infrastructure and the possibility of sabotage after London Heathrow was force to close by a major power cut. Airport management say it will remain closed until 2359 GMT (1959 Eastern) tonight.
One of the world’s busiest airports, Heathrow will typically handle over 1,300 flights in a day and analysis by Flightradar24 states “at least 1,351” flights to and from the airport will be impacted today. Yet the disruption will inevitably go far further and impact thousands more flights, as Heathrow is a major hub for refuelling flights and crew changeovers.
Those aircraft that were to be on cancelled flights will not now be positioned correctly for their subsequent planned journeys, meaning disruption could last for hours or days more.