WHAT CAUSED HEATHROW AIRPORT TO CLOSE
A fire at an electrical substation in west London prompted a power outage that led to the closure of the United Kingdom’s busiest airport.
At least 120 flights that were in the air had to be diverted to other airports, and a Heathrow spokesperson said “significant disruption” is expected in the coming days.
Flightradar24 said that more than 1,000 flights will be affected by the airport’s closure.
Another Singaporean affected was 66-year-old Jacinta Yong, who was looking forward to a two-week trip to London and Edinburgh to meet her daughter and grandchildren.
She spoke to CNA as she was waiting in the taxi queue before she headed home to search for a new flight option.
“We are going off for holiday, and then I also booked a musical, so I have to cancel, and I’m (likely) not going to get back my money,” said the 66-year-old, who works in the mental health field.
She added that the captain announced the diversion while she was up in the air, but that some passengers had already suspected it would happen as they had seen the news on their phones.
British doctor Phyo Tun, 42, saw that the flight had turned around on the flight tracker on board before the announcement was made.
For about 10 minutes, she was worried about what might have happened.
“At the time the weather looked all right, (I thought) maybe there was an emergency patient,” she told CNA.
Dr Tun said that she would have preferred it if the flight had been diverted to somewhere between London and Singapore.
“(We flew) nearly seven hours and (ended up) back in Singapore, then we have to fly back another 13, 14 hours,” she said.
