One of the busiest airports in the world is closed for unprecedented working days, disrupting air travel around the world.
Serious questions were promptly raised about the resilience of critical national infrastructure and the potential for sabotage after London's Heathrow was forced to approach a massive blackout. Airport management says it will remain closed until 2359 GMT (East 1959) tonight.
One of the busiest airports in the world, Heathrow usually processes over 1,300 flights per day, and if “at least 1,351” flights to and from the airport are affected today, analyses by lightradar24 are affected. However, as Heathrow is the main hub for refueling and crew replacement, the confusion will inevitably go further, affecting thousands more flights.
The aircraft on the cancelled flight were not properly placed for subsequent planned journeys. This means that confusion can last for hours or days.
Update 1230: Counter Terrorism Police Major Investigation, but there are no signs of cause yet
While the UK counterterrorism police have been working from aiding the investigation to leading the investigation, the Metropolitan Police Department is still unknown because counterterrorism officers have specialized investigation skills, and the cause of the flames that took one of the UK's largest power transformer sites overnight is still unknown. The police said:
We are working with the London Fire Service to establish the cause of the fire under investigation. Currently, there are no signs of foul play, but at this point he is still open-minded.
Given the location of the substation and the impact that the incident had on important national infrastructure, Met's counterterrorism command is currently a major inquiry.
This is due to the specialized resources and capabilities within that command, which can help you proceed with this investigation with PACE, minimizing confusion and identifying the cause.
As suspected, transformer oil that cools and isolates high voltage equipment has been found to contribute to the fire. The London Fire Department said 25,000 liters (6,600 gallons) of mineral oil “has completely gone.” Now it's reduced to 10% down due to the efforts of the firefighters.
Meanwhile, the International Air Travel Association (IATA), a trade organisation that expresses the interest of airlines around the world, has been receiving serious criticism for Heathrow Airport itself, pointing out that today's major disruption is due to major transport nodes that are not prepared for disasters, but airlines are expected to win costs.
Their statement I said:
This is another case of Heathrow dropping both travelers and airlines. And it asks for some serious questions. First, critical infrastructure of national and global importance is entirely dependent on a single power source with no alternatives. As it is, as is, it is a clear failure of the airport's plan. And then there comes the question of who is owing the cost of caring for the confused traveler.
Unless Heathrow takes on the outcome of that failure, it “has little incentive to improve,” the body said.
The plane is parked in the terminal as the UK's Heathrow Airport closed for a full day on Friday after destroying flights of hundreds of thousands of passengers on one of Europe's largest travel hubs on Friday, March 21, 2025.
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British newspapers Guardian Quote Aviation insider brings the level of disruption of air travel across the “unprecedented” and “devastating” world.
Airport and over 60,000.”customer“It lost its strength overnight when fire broke out in the main electrical material of Northhide, West London. Witnesses said there was a 'white white' light from the transformer.
Large transformers are usually oil-cooled, but explosions of this size are very rare.
An investigation into the cause of the fire is underway between firefighters and metropolitan police. Given the sudden prevalence of once-in-a-lifetime tier “accidents” in Europe and the undoubtedly responsible for the Russian door, the reason for the fire has yet to be stated, question Whether this is the latest act of what is called the “hybrid warfare” campaign in Moscow was inevitably and promptly raised.
others pointed In fact, one of the most consequential airports in the world could be completely closed by a fire at just one airport.
British Energy Minister Ed Miliband, who is usually known for his dogmatic net zero crusades rather than being interested in strengthening critical infrastructure against accidents and attacks, spoke about the substations he called “catastrophic” on Friday morning. Betray the obvious lack of understanding What is the current for?he Good morning Britain programfor example, “This morning I spoke to the National Grid. We saw a devastating fire. The substation understands the backup generation being implemented, not only affecting the generation from the substation.”
He said: “National Grid said in a conversation with me this morning that they had never seen anything like the scale of what had happened before, and that was the severity of the fire that knocked out the backup.
He told the radio station LBC “There is no suggestion that there is a foul play,” but in the context this seemed to mean that the hand evidence did not appear to take any intentional action, but that there was still no information about the cause.
Councillor Richard Ty spoke GB News Friday morning to argue that Heathrow's hardness against extraordinary events was weakened by push to decarbonize the airport. Reform lawmakers said he told industry insiders that the airport had told him they had replaced diesel generators for biomass generators.
“Their net zero compliant backup system completely failed with the core functionality I asked for the first time,” Tice said. Heathrow Certainly there is a biomass energy systemhowever, whether this was linked to today's “devastating” blackouts has not yet been proven positive.
This story is developing, and continues
