The head of a top world air transport trade group wants to know how Europe’s busiest airport didn’t have enough backup to withstand a fire that’s brought the entire operation to a grinding halt.
The closure of Heathrow today “begs some serious questions” and how this piece of “critical infrastructure — of national and global importance— is totally dependent on a single power source without an alternative,” said Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
“If that is the case — as it seems — then it is a clear planning failure by the airport,” Walsh continued. “And, from that arises the question of who bears the costs of taking care of disrupted travelers. We must find a fairer allocation of passenger care costs than airlines alone picking up the tab when infrastructure fails. Until that happens, Heathrow has very little incentive to improve.”
Power has been temporarily restored to parts of Heathrow Airport and all utility customers in the surrounding areas who were impacted by the fire at the North Hyde substation, National Grid UK said.
The power was restored following a reconfiguration of the network in partnership with SSEN Distribution, the local operator, the power company said on social media.
“This is an interim solution while we carry out further work at North Hyde to return the substation and our network to normal operation,” the post read. “We are continuing to work closely with all stakeholders to manage this incident, and are focused on returning to normal resilience levels as soon as possible.”
Heathrow Airport said it expected “significant disruption” over the coming days due to the power outage caused by the fire at a nearby electrical substation. The airport had previously said it would be shut until at least midnight local time, with no flights leaving today.
“Whilst fire crews are responding to the incident, we do not have clarity on when power may be reliably restored,” a Heathrow spokesperson said in a statement.
The spokesperson added that passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until it reopens.
“We know this will be disappointing for passengers and we want to reassure that we are working as hard as possible to resolve the situation,” the statement said.
NBC News’ Raf Sanchez reports on the global travel chaos caused by Heathrow’s closure and when disruptions could start to ease.
The electricity substation fire caused a power outage not just at Heathrow, but in the west London area of Hayes, and neighbors there came together to help one another out, even banding together in a bid to rescue a pregnant woman who was trapped in an elevator after the power suddenly failed.
Authorities said almost 5,000 energy customers were still without power this morning.
A man records smoke billowing from a fire at a an electrical substation in Hayes, west London, early today. @chrisjbrogan AFP – Getty Images
“The positive thing about this was how the residents got together and helped each other out,” Meftun Temiz, a CloudOps Support Analyst at NBC News, said. “People were offering their power banks to charge their phones, candles for light.”
At one point, Temiz said he and others also tried to rescue a pregnant woman trapped in an elevator before they eventually called the fire brigade, who arrived within minutes.
“Thankfully she was very calm about it,” he said. And also, thankfully, he said the water and electricity had returned to his home after being out for hours.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said today that there were questions about how a fire at a single electricity substation had caused Europe’s busiest airport to shut down.
“There are questions to answer. We expect those questions to be answered, but our clarity right now is on this incident being appropriately dealt with,” a spokesperson for Starmer told British PA News, a British news agency.
“There is a fire still burning. So, there will be a time for that, but at the moment the priority is to deal with the incident,” the spokesperson said, adding that that other U.K. airports were being checked for “resilience.”
Becky Davies, 41, traveled to Las Vegas from Doncaster, a town in northern England, to celebrate her 20th wedding anniversary with her husband. But now, the couple is stuck in the city and unable to return home to their kids.
“It was a special trip for us. It’s just a shame it’s all gone so wrong at the end,” she said.
Chris and Becky Davies in Las Vegas.Courtesy Becky Davies
Davies, who was due to fly back to London on a Virgin Atlantic flight at 9:45 p.m. PT (6:45 a.m. ET) said she was standing at the gates when a staff member from the airline told the couple they would be given overnight accommodation at a nearby hotel after all flights were suspended due to Heathrow’s shutdown.
But when they got to the hotel, Davies said the room they had been given was “just awful,” adding, “Someone had been staying in there, and nobody came to make the room up once they checked out. There was rubbish everywhere.”
The couple, who have four children, three at home, eventually returned to the airport to find other accommodation, but Davies said she was eager to return home. “My youngest is only 8, so she was so excited to see us come home,” she added.
London’s Metropolitan Police’s counterterrorism unit is investigating the cause of the electricity substation fire that brought Heathrow to a standstill last night and into today, but sabotage was not suspected.
A Met spokesperson told NBC News that there was no indication of any foul play, but added that it had not yet ruled out the possibility.
Smoke billows from a fire at an electrical substation in Hayes, west London, early today.@chrisjbrogan via X / AFP – Getty Images
Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
Planes sit on the tarmac as passengers face an agonizing wait for news with their luggage outside Heathrow Airport in London today.
Chez Khan spent the past week away from his family at a work conference in Las Vegas, but now, the 47-year-old client services director from London finds himself stranded in a hotel that’s a 45-minute drive from the airport.
“We were just in the dark for about three to four hours” after the power outage at Heathrow, Khan told NBC News over the phone.
When his airline carrier, Virgin Atlantic, directed a group of passengers including Khan to a Holiday Inn near the airport, the hotel staff told them that no one had contacted them and that they had no rooms available.
“We were then sent back to the airport, and no staff were available to help,” he said, adding, “So we were literally left stranded in Vegas.”
Khan, who eventually found other accommodation through work, said that he has since been waiting for further updates about when he can get a new flight home.
“The biggest impact for me personally is missing the kids,” he said, adding, “That I was away from home for a week was already a challenge.”
Trains on London’s typically busy Elizabeth line, which runs on an east–west axis across the British capital, were unusually quiet this morning, as passengers traveling to and from Heathrow were absent.
The eastbound train is normally filled with weary looking travelers headed into the city and out east, their luggage often taking up large swaths of the floor space.
A mostly empty train today on London’s typically busy Elizabeth line.Chantal Da Silva / NBC News
But this morning, it was eerily quiet until passengers traveling from the busy Paddington Station began to file in.
The Elizabeth line is named after the late Queen Elizabeth II, who formally opened it in May 2022. Since then, it’s become a popular means of travel to Heathrow, providing speedy service to the airport.
She was supposed to run two major sessions at an education conference in Chicago, but Halleli Pinson, 51, a professor of sociology of education at Israel’s Ben Gurion University, is stuck in London.
“I’m not only missing my own talk, I’m missing other responsibilities that I have,” Pinson told NBC News today in a telephone call. She added that the earliest British Airways could fly her to Chicago was Monday, but by then it would be too late.
Pinson’s sister, Shira Pinson, is a multimedia producer for NBC News who lives in London and said she will be able to “put up or put up with her sister.” But Halleli said she was “frustrated” with British Airways because they had not made “any efforts to put me on a different airline or a different flight.”
“I’m supposed to fly business class and I’m willing to fly a lower class — I just want to get to Chicago but they’re not willing to the change that,” she said.
Pinson said she woke up in the early hours of the morning and read a news alert about the airport’s closure. “I couldn’t fall asleep afterwards for obvious reasons,” she added.
While British Airways sent Pinson an email at 5:30 a.m. local time (1:30 a.m. ET) telling her the flight had been delayed, she said it took her more than three hours to speak to someone at the airline.
This was “very frustrating,” she added.
Delta, American Airlines, and Jet Blue have issued travel waivers for passengers affected by the flight disruptions at Heathrow.
Delta Air Lines said it would waive the fare difference while reissuing tickets to passengers flying between March 21 and March 23 to and from the airport by no later than March 26.
Those unable to reschedule their flights within these guidelines “may cancel their reservation and apply any unused value of the ticket toward the purchase of a new ticket for one year from the original ticket issuance,” it said in a statement.
American Airlines said it would waive its fees for any passengers looking to change flights if they bought their ticket by March 20, were scheduled to fly between March 21 and March 22, and could travel between March 22 and 26. Customers could only rebook to the same destination and in the same cabin, it said in a statement.
Jet Blue said that none of its flights would be going to and from Heathrow, adding that additional flights may be scheduled once the airport reopens to accommodate affected passengers.
The London Fire Brigade said that the fire that left Heathrow in the dark and unable to serve passengers involved an electrical substation with 25,000 liters of cooling oil that was on fire.
Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
Jonathan Smith, deputy commissioner with the fire brigade, told a news conference this morning that the fire began at 8:23 p.m. last night (4:23 p.m. ET) and it took 10 fire engines and 70 personnel to get it under control.
Firefighters evacuated 29 people from surrounding homes, and 150 more in an exclusion zone were taken to a rest center.
“Our firefighters worked tirelessly in challenging and very hazardous conditions under control as swiftly as possible,” he said, adding that the fire is now 90% extinguished.
Smith would not comment on the cause of the fire.
Taylor Collier-Brown is stranded in Geneva with her hockey team after their flight to Heathrow was canceled following a skiing trip to Morzine in the French Alps.
The hockey team in Morzine, France.Courtesy Taylor Collier-Brown
She’s hoping there’s a way for the British team to get back to London before a match tomorrow.
“Eleven hockey girls with a match tomorrow can’t make it back — the whole team is in Geneva,” she said.
The team is asking if anyone has a jet to get it home before the big game.
Travelers at London’s Paddington Station were left scrambling for solutions after Heathrow airport was closed because of a widespread power outage. A fire at a nearby electrical substation knocked out power to the airport.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan thanked emergency services for working overnight to tackle the fire at Heathrow that led to the power outage, adding that there had been no reports of any injuries in a statement posted on X.
“I know this will be hugely frustrating for the many thousands expecting to travel to and from Heathrow today, the families who have had their power cut and the commuters who have had their journey disrupted,” he said.
He added that electricity suppliers were “working hard to restore power.”
Kazumi Nakamura and her 13-year-old daughter, Mana, from Vancouver, Canada, were among the would-be flyers now scrambling to book new flights.
Standing in Paddington Station as they tried to get on the phone with their airline, Air Canada, Nakamura said she was “a little bit upset,” but thankfully, it was still spring break for her daughter, so they weren’t too worried about getting back home immediately.
Kazumi Nakamura and her 13-year-old daughter, Mana.Chantal Da Silva / NBC News
“It’s OK. We’re not in a rush,” Nakamura, 50, said. “But we want to go home.”
Mana said she was feeling “a bit overwhelmed,” but that her time in London was worth it, with the mother and daughter taking in some of the city’s biggest stage shows, including “Wicked” and “My Neighbor Totoro.”
“I liked watching all the shows,” she said.
Chris J. Ratcliffe / Bloomberg via Getty Images
Chris J. Ratcliffe / Bloomberg via Getty Images
Passengers carrying their luggage were met with empty check-in desks at Terminal 4 of London Heathrow this morning, after a nearby fire shut down operations across one of the world’s busiest airports.
At London’s Paddington Station, crowds of people could be seen standing around with luggage, many looking frustrated and forlorn, as updates on the situation at Heathrow rang out in service announcements.
Security workers at the station said they had expected it to be even busier amid the cancellations, but that they expected the airport closure would continue to cause confusion throughout the day.
Rail passengers at London’s Paddington Station this morning.Chantal Da Silva / NBC News
Foluke Oleniwen was one of the lucky ones who had just missed all the chaos at Heathrow, safely arriving in London on a flight from Nigeria this morning right as the airport was beginning to shut down.
“I’m relieved and at the same time I feel empathy for people who were affected because that could have been me or anybody,” said, Oleniwen, 40, a support worker based in Gloucester, where she’s headed now. She said she also felt bad for those who risked missing important life events due to the delays, such as weddings and funerals.
Foluke Oleniwen.Chantal Da Silva / NBC News
Oleniwen said she was told about the fire after she arrived at the airport amid the commotion. “I hope they’ll be able to sort it soon,” she said.
Los Angeles-based comedian Adam Conover was on his way to London for a gig when his flight to Heathrow was diverted midair.
“We were in the air for about it 90 minutes and they had just finished dinner service,” Conover, 42, creator of “The G Word” on Netflix said in a phone interview this morning. “Then the captain came on and said there was a fire … we had to turn around.”
Adam Conover.Netflix
After a brief nap, he said, he’ll be flying to New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, where he faces a four-hour layover before flying out to Manchester, with plans to then take an hourslong train ride before finally arriving in London.
He said the journey was a testament to how “hard stand-up comedians work” to make people laugh — and after this experience, he’s likely to have some fresh material.
Australia’s flag carrier Qantas said today it has canceled and diverted fights following the closure of Heathrow.
Its Singapore-London and Perth-London flights were diverted to Paris today, with buses arranged to take customers on to London, a spokesperson said in a statement.
Another flight from London to Perth has been canceled and customers will be accommodated on other flights, the statement said.
“Our teams are working hard to support impacted customers and we thank them for their patience,” the spokesperson added.
Etihad Airways, the United Arab Emirates’ national airline, has canceled four flights following the closure of Heathrow.
One flight previously bound to Heathrow has been diverted to an airport in Germany, the airline said in a statement, with another from Heathrow to the UAE’s capital, Abu Dhabi, delayed until further notice.
Etihad said it’s “working closely” with guests affected to notify them of the changes to their itineraries.
Images emerging from Terminal 4 of London’s Heathrow Airport this morning show passengers forced to haul their luggage down a darkened stairwell, using only what appears to be a cellphone to light the way.
James Manning / PA via Getty Images
British Energy Secretary Ed Miliband called the substation fire that caused the closure of Heathrow “catastrophic.”
A backup generator at the substation near Heathrow Airport was also affected by the fire, Miliband told Sky News, calling the situation “unusual and unprecedented.”
It is “too early to know” what caused the “catastrophic fire,” he said.
Miliband says he has spoken to the National Grid, which controls the country’s energy network, about the situation but added that he was reluctant to jump to conclusions about the fire’s cause.
The flight impact from today’s power outage at Heathrow was comparable to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks or the Icelandic volcanic ash cloud in April 2010, an aviation expert said.
About 200,000 passengers are expected to be affected by the closure of Heathrow Airport, which handled a record-breaking 83.9 million passengers last year and is the world’s fourth-busiest airport.
Grounded planes at Heathrow this morning.Carlos Jasso / Reuters
“It’s a contained version of 9/11 or, to an extent, the Icelandic volcanic eruption … that’s the parallel I would make,” consultant John Strickland told the British PA News agency today.
“I remembered seeing on those occasions — particularly more so on 9/11 — it happened so quick and then U.S. airspace was closed, they were turning back aircraft and holding planes,” he said, adding, “Heathrow being such a busy airport and full, there’s no kind of wriggle room for getting out of these kind of things.”
The United Kingdom’s Air Traffic Control said it had “well-rehearsed plans in place” to deal with such incidents, including aircraft being required to either turn back or divert to a non-U.K. airport, along with other flights being stopped at their points of departure.
Heathrow Express, a train service that connects passengers to the airport from Paddington station in central London, told passengers this morning: “Please DO NOT ATTEMPT to travel to the airport under any circumstance.”
In a post on X, it said it was running a half-hourly reduced service for passengers stranded at the terminals to help them leave the airport this morning. It added that it would not be accepting any passengers from Paddington Station.
Singapore Airlines, the city state’s flag carrier, said at least eight of its fights have been affected by the closure of Heathrow.
Five flights to and from Heathrow have been canceled, a spokesperson said in a statement, with the rest affected being diverted to different locations or returned to Singapore.
The airline said it will provide all necessary assistance to the affected passengers, including providing hotel accommodation, and accommodating them on alternative flights or land transport.
Other flights between Singapore and Heathrow may also be affected, it said.
Heathrow’s closure will affect more than 1,300 flights and thousands of travelers after flights were canceled while those already in the air were diverted.
Stranded passengers at Heathrow this morning.James Manning / PA via Getty Images
According to the tracking website FlightRadar24, 679 flights were scheduled to land and 678 flights were scheduled to take off from Heathrow today.
“We have well-rehearsed plans in place which includes a requirement for aircraft to either turn back or divert to a non-UK airport, as well as stopping other flights at their point of departure,” the UK air traffic controller NATS said in a statement.
Here’s a recap of which airline carriers have been affected:
- British Airways said all 341 flights scheduled to land at Heathrow today had been “significantly” impacted and advised customers not to travel to the airport until further notice.
- Virgin Atlantic said it had canceled all flights arriving and departing from Heathrow until midday today.
- United Airlines said seven United flights returned to their origin or other airports, and that flights scheduled to London Heathrow today were canceled.
- Air India said flight AI129 from Mumbai to Heathrow was returning to Mumbai and AI161 from Delhi was diverting to Frankfurt, while all remaining flights to and from London Heathrow, including AI111 this morning, had been canceled.
- Aer Lingus said it had canceled all flights to and from Heathrow Airport until further notice today.
- Qantas said its Singapore-London and Perth-London services had been diverted to Paris today, with buses arranged to take customers on to London.
- Scandinavian Airlines SAS said all 12 round-trip flights to and from Heathrow today had been canceled.
- Emirates said flights EK001/002, EK029/030, and EK031/032 had been canceled, according to Conde Nast Traveller.
- Etihad diverted flight EY61 from Abu Dhabi to Frankfurt, and canceled flights EY63, EY64, EY65, and EY66 between Heathrow and Abu Dhabi, the airlines said, according to Conde Nast Traveller.
The flight was scheduled for 11:55 p.m. from New York to Heathrow. But an hour before departure, Justin Mitselmakher, a NBC News production assistant, was told at the Delta Air Lines gate, “because of the weather, there’s like a 10 minute delay.”
“The word closed for 24 hours was not being talked about at all, not in the slightest,” he said.
Mitselmakher and his co-passengers soon found out from news reports about the situation at Heathrow and asked the gate agents, who still awaited confirmation. “I spoke to one woman, and she said, I just want to know if it’s canceled to not.”
Another attendant for a separate flight, also to Heathrow, then said on the speaker, “I’m looking into Manchester, who wants to go to Manchester,” he said. The crowd “erupted in applause” because it seemed like an “option to get them to the U.K. in any form possible,” Mitselmakher added.
National Grid in the U.K. said that as of 6:00 GMT today, power has been restored to around 62,000 customers, with 4,900 currently without power.
Firefighters at the scene this morning.Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
“We are working at speed to restore power supplies as quickly as possible,” the National Grid, which controls the country’s electricity network, said in an X post.
Restoration efforts will continue this morning and further updates will be provided, it said.
Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, the Netherland’s main international airport and major European transit hub, said today around 15 flights scheduled to and from Heathrow have been canceled.
Around 30 flights are scheduled to and from London Heathrow, the airport said in a statement.
“At this moment, half of them have been canceled,” it added.
Virgin Atlantic has canceled all flights until midday today, a spokesperson for the British carrier said in a statement, “with the rest of today’s schedule currently under review.”
Flights already airborne and en route to Heathrow are either being diverted elsewhere or are returning to their origin airport, the airline said, advising passengers to not travel for their flight if either the departure or arrival airport is Heathrow.
A string of social media posts from onlookers show the size and ferocity of the blaze in west London that has paralyzed Heathrow Airport.
Another video captured Heathrow plunged into darkness as lights turned off following the fire.
Hong Kong’s flag carrier, Cathay Pacific, said today it has canceled flights to and from London.
Two Cathay Pacific flights, CX239 and CX253, from Hong Kong to London scheduled today have been canceled, the airline said in a statement, adding that all Cathay flights from London to Hong Kong today have also been canceled.
The airline said it’s assessing the situation and will keep customers informed with the latest updates.
Police officers and firefighters at the scene where a fire broke out at a substation serving Heathrow Airport in Hayes, west London, overnight.
Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
Benjamin Cremel / AFP – Getty Images
The U.K. flag carrier, British Airways, said it’s redirecting inbound flights already on their way to Heathrow to other airports in the country where possible.
The closure of Heathrow will “clearly have a significant impact on our operation and our customers, British Airways said today in a statement.
Customers will be updated on their travel options for the next 24 hours and beyond, it said, advising them not to travel to Heathrow until further notice.
Roslan Rahman / AFP – Getty Images
Roslan Rahman / AFP – Getty Images
A departure board at Singapore Changi Airport shows a canceled flight to Heathrow in the early hours of today.
The London Fire Brigade said at around 6 a.m. local time (2 a.m. ET) that part of a transformer in the electricity substation is still on fire, but progress has been made.
“This is a highly visible and significant incident, and our firefighters are working tirelessly in challenging conditions to bring the fire under control as swiftly as possible,” Fire Brigade Assistant Commissioner Pat Goulbourne said in a statement.
“Thanks to their efforts, we have made good progress in containing the fire and preventing further spread,” he said.
London Gatwick Airport is accepting flights diverted from Heathrow, a spokesperson said.
“We are aware of the situation at Heathrow Airport today and we are supporting by accepting diverted flights as required,” the Gatwick spokesperson said in a statement.
Gatwick said it had accepted seven diverted flights originally scheduled to land at Heathrow while flights are operating from London Gatwick as normal today.
National Rail said today that there will be no trains to or from Heathrow Airport, in what it called a “major disruption.”
Heathrow is closed all day due to a power failure, caused by a fire at an electric substation.
Heathrow said that “passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until the airport reopens.”
The flight tracking site FlightRadar24 estimates that at least 1,351 flights will be affected by the full closure of Heathrow Airport.
The 1,351 flights number is based on the flights scheduled to arrive at or depart from Heathrow, FlightRadar24 said.
“That doesn’t include any flights that might be canceled or delayed due to aircraft being out of position,” it said on X.
Heathrow said there may be disruptions for days.
London Heathrow Airport, shuttered by a fire at a nearby electric substation, is the busiest airport in the United Kingdom and has been ranked as fourth busiest in the world.
The international airport had a record 83.9 million passengers last year and has predicted 84.2 million passengers in 2025, Heathrow has said.
The trade group Airports Council International World in June 2024 listed the airport as the fourth busiest in the world, citing 2023 data.
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in the U.S. was the busiest in that ranking, followed by Dubai, Dallas-Fort Worth and then Heathrow.
Flight tracking site FlightRadar24 said this morning local time that “120 aircraft in the air that will be diverting to alternate airports or returning to their origins.”
Heathrow said on social media that passengers should contact their airlines for further information.
The fire at an electric substation in Hayes, near Heathrow, is “a highly visible and significant incident,” and disruptions are expected this morning, a London Fire Brigade official said.
“The fire has caused a power outage affecting a large number of homes and local businesses, and we are working closely with our partners to minimise disruption,” Assistant Commissioner Pat Goulbourne said in a statement.
Firefighters were expected on the scene all night, and the public was urged to avoid the area.
The Fire Brigade was called at 11:23 p.m. local time, the firefighting agency said.
The cause of the fire was not known, it said. Heavy smoke was reported, and people nearby were urged to close their windows.
A video posted on social media showed the inside of the airport with only emergency lighting.
London’s Heathrow Airport closed today local time and will remain closed all day after a fire at a nearby electricity substation caused power outages at the major transportation center.
“Whilst fire crews are responding to the incident, we do not have clarity on when power may be reliably restored,” the airport said in a statement early today.
“To maintain the safety of our passengers and colleagues, we have no choice but to close Heathrow until 23h59 on 21 March 2025,” the airport said.
The airport said that it expects “significant disruption over the coming days” and that it would notify the public as more becomes known.
