Heathrow Airport closed all day Friday 21 March 2025

Another theory:

One industry source has said that Net Zero is to blame because Heathrow is moving from diesel back-up generators to biomass - and the system failed when the substation went up in flames.

Will some planes divert to Gatwick or other airports? We've been diverted to Schiphol, then smaller plane to Stanstead. Worked well.

And this is the Heathrow where another runway is planned. Hope they put a few more shillings in the electricity meter.

🤣

The net zero madness has a lot to answer for in my opinion.

It seems madness to me that Heathrow doesn’t have its own power system or at least a generator in case of a failure. Many thousands of people delayed and inconvenienced, how many weddings, funerals and other occasions missed. I’m so glad not one of them. My flying days are definitely over!

HelterSkelter1

And this is the Heathrow where another runway is planned. Hope they put a few more shillings in the electricity meter.

Yes!!

Norah

Will some planes divert to Gatwick or other airports? We've been diverted to Schiphol, then smaller plane to Stanstead. Worked well.

A few might be but Heathrow is the busiest airport in Europe.

About 1,300 landings and take-off arrive/leave from Heathrow every day.

The back up generator apparently used to be diesel, it was changed to electric a while ago in the interests of green efficiency, someone didn’t have their thinking caps on methinks, I suspect this will be a problem for quite a few days for 1000s of folks

Two of my nieces have gone on holiday together today, and their flight out was diverted from Heathrow to Gatwick, they were lucky.
I think they have filled all the available slots at other airports in the UK possible without affecting their own scheduled flights, and other flights have been diverted to arrive back in Europe rather than the UK. It must be a pain for arrivals who have had their flights home diverted, imagine landing at say, Cardiff or Glasgow instead of Heathrow in the middle of the night and having to find your own way home, or back to Heathrow to pick up your car.
Hopefully though this incident will prompt an urgent review of security and safety at sub stations.

We have Dd1 and lovely SiL arriving this evening but from Gatwick thank goodness. Hopefully their flight won’t be affected, although I can imagine that many will try to find alternative routes.

We just landed at Heathrow a day ago. We've been so lucky. I do feel sorry for all those displaced travellers especially the ones on long haul flights. They'd arrive already tired and have to try to work out what to do.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvg5dg4p2l0o

Counter terrorism police are investigating. Curiously I was walking with a friend yesterday deep in the countryside and we came across an electricity sub station which had a fence around it but wouldn't be difficult to enter for the determined. We both separately thought of terrorism as Russian sabotage continues.
Today's Food Programme, Radio 4 is all about food security. Apparently the UK has a list of 89 risk scenarios and the food supply isn't one of them. The programme goes on to explain why this is a serious underestimate. The relatively peaceful era we have lived through seems to be ending.

Apparently there was a planned outage beforehand, so I'm guessing that they were doing work on the substation, not all homes are out in the area though.
It is delightfully quite here in the suburbs of west London, far removed from the usual noisy skies.

SaxonGrace

The back up generator apparently used to be diesel, it was changed to electric a while ago in the interests of green efficiency, someone didn’t have their thinking caps on methinks, I suspect this will be a problem for quite a few days for 1000s of folks

I heard that the back up generator runs on biofuels, though no way of knowing which is true.

Yes, read all about this on Facebook.

So sorry to hear this ..

......and Rachel Reeves wants to "push further and faster" with a third runway for Heathrow while provincial airports around the country, which would have helped, have been closed down

I'm far enough from Heathrow not to be affected by power loss but near enough to benefit from the quiet skies. I remember how quiet it was during lockdown 5 years ago. I rarely notice the planes as I'm used to it but we noticed the quiet on our walk this morning.

Allira

Norah

Will some planes divert to Gatwick or other airports? We've been diverted to Schiphol, then smaller plane to Stanstead. Worked well.

A few might be but Heathrow is the busiest airport in Europe.

About 1,300 landings and take-off arrive/leave from Heathrow every day.

I know Heathrow is busy with landings.

I merely wordered if inbound planes were diverted to near airports? I'd imagine the news will inform - as will people's computer updates.

Some which had set out were turned back, I think Norah

Norah

Allira

Norah

Will some planes divert to Gatwick or other airports? We've been diverted to Schiphol, then smaller plane to Stanstead. Worked well.

A few might be but Heathrow is the busiest airport in Europe.

About 1,300 landings and take-off arrive/leave from Heathrow every day.

I know Heathrow is busy with landings.

I merely wordered if inbound planes were diverted to near airports? I'd imagine the news will inform - as will people's computer updates.

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/heathrow-airport-closed-live-uk-london-fire-power-outage-b2719144.html
20 minutes ago

The flight tracker is interesting

www.independent.co.uk/tv/news/heathrow-airport-closed-fire-flight-delay-tracker-b2719198.html

Allira

Some which had set out were turned back, I think Norah

I'd imagine many were turned back, some say half way though the flight, may have had to divert - hopefully to somewhere easy for onward flights.

Interesting story of Gander, Newfoundland - stranded passengers comes to mind.

Norah

Allira

Some which had set out were turned back, I think Norah

I'd imagine many were turned back, some say half way though the flight, may have had to divert - hopefully to somewhere easy for onward flights.

Interesting story of Gander, Newfoundland - stranded passengers comes to mind.

Hotels at Heathrow have been accused of profiteering, charging £650 pn. 😡

It must have been frightening for local residents, a loud bang then fire. They've been evacuated from their homes too

Some other airports have been put on alert Norah, our regional one included, but it depends on the runway length of some for the larger planes.