CLEARING THE BACKLOG
The closure is set to have days-long knock-on effects globally, leaving many passengers stranded as carriers reconfigure their networks to move planes and crews around.
British Airways has warned in the past that Heathrow is so overstretched that recovering from disruption can cause even more chaos, as planes and staff must be properly repositioned even as the facility continues to run at full capacity.
“There will be impact running on several days because once aircraft are grounded somewhere away from an operation, they are stuck there with the crews operating the flights,” said aviation consultant and network planning expert John Strickland.
Britain’s airspace is among the busiest in Europe, and technical outages have raised concern in the past.
An outage of Britain’s air traffic control system NATS in 2023 cost over £100 million, according to the CAA.
Heathrow’s shutdown has brought into focus contingency planning at other global airports as well.
Pittsburgh International Airport CEO Christina Cassotis told Reuters the airport’s own microgrid helped it operate smoothly two weeks back when fires broke out at two separate substations.
Tim Green, head of department for electrical and electronic engineering at Imperial College, London, saw his UK-bound flight forced to turn back to North Carolina on Friday.
Speaking to Reuters, he described the complex arteries feeding into Heathrow, which consumed 271,080 MWh of grid electricity in 2023, according to its annual report.
“There’s a lot going on at an airport,” he said.
Heathrow must supply power to shops, restaurants, public spaces and emergency lighting, he said, while a separate category of electricity supply feeds safety systems like radars, navigation equipment and landing lights.
“Some of that will, of course, be backed up by emergency generators. But I think the airport would rather shut down some of its operations than accept more aircraft when it’s in a compromised state like that,” Green said.
