Heathrow Airport "Fully Operational" After Fire Causes Temporary Shutdown

AFP | London
Email : editor@newsofbahrain.com

Heathrow Airport confirmed it was "fully operational" on Saturday after a fire at a power substation caused significant disruptions the previous day. The fire, which occurred at an off-airport power station, knocked out electricity to the airport, leading to the closure of the facility for much of Friday.

The outage affected thousands of passengers worldwide, grounding flights and causing widespread cancellations and delays. Around 1,350 flights were impacted, according to FlightRadar24. Planes that were already in the air when the shutdown occurred were diverted, while others remained grounded.

Operations resumed later in the evening, but the airport warned that delays and cancellations would continue as efforts were made to clear the backlog of flights. "We can confirm that Heathrow is now fully operational," an airport spokesperson said on Saturday. "Teams across the airport are working tirelessly to support passengers and reposition aircraft and crews."

While the situation was stabilizing, questions were raised about the reliability of one of the UK's most critical infrastructure hubs, with the power failure highlighting potential vulnerabilities.