Over 90 airlines threaten Heathrow with legal action after airport shut down due to substation fire
24 March 2025, 21:43
A body representing more than 90 airlines, including British airways and Virgin Atlantic, has threatened Heathrow with legal action and called for an independent inquiry after the fire.
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Heathrow was thrust into chaos on Friday as Europe's busiest airport was brought to a standstill by a substation inferno, with thousands stranded, hundreds of flights cancelled, and over 100 nearby residents evacuated.
The airlines threatened the legal action if a settlement is not reached to compensate them for costs they incurred from the closure.
Thursday's fire caused a power outage at Heathrow, which caused the airport to close for 18 hours.
Thousands of homes were left without power and more than 100 people were evacuated. Well over 1,000 flights were cancelled.
The chief executive of Heathrow Airline Operators' Committee Nigel Wicking has now said he hoped the situation could be "amicably settled at some point in time".
Read more: Why Heathrow Airport boss 'went to bed' as inferno raged while 300,000 passengers faced flight chaos
But, he told Sky News, "if we don't get good enough recourse and repayment in terms of the costs, then yes, there might be a case for legal action".
"I would hope not. But in some of these situations that's the only course once you've gone through everything else", he added.
Heathrow is the UK's largest airport, with more than 83.9 million passengers travelling through its terminals in 2024.
More than 200,000 passengers were affected by the outage, which caused cancellations and delays.
After a day of chaos, a Heathrow spokesperson confirmed on Saturday that the airport was "open and fully operational" but warned passengers to check with their airlines.
However, passengers still experienced issues, as many had to reschedule their holidays or find accommodation.
Mr Wicking has now called for an independent investigation into the events of Friday, and why it took so long to get Heathrow running again.
"Airlines have a regulatory duty to take care of their passengers," he said.
"But in this particular case, we do feel that it was another party that caused the situation."
Simon Calder breaks down the 'unprecedented scale' of Heathrow shutdown
Airport boss Thomas Woldbye has said the "major incident" at Heathrow was "unprecedented" as they had to re-route the power supply after the blaze.
He told the BBC that he is "sincerely sorry" for the inconvenience to passengers.
"We were handling the consequences of that failure," he said.
"Heathrow uses as much energy as a city every day," Woldbye continued, explaining that power outages bring the airports huge operation to a standstill for hours.
Counter-terrorism police are currently leading the investigation into the incident - however the Met says there's currently no indication of foul play.
On Saturday morning London Heathrow to Zurich took off at 6:11am, just eleven minutes delayed, while London Heathrow to Madrid took off at 6:16am.
More than 200,000 passengers were affected on Friday, with thousands of homes were left without power leading to around 150 people to be evacuated from surrounding properties in Hayes, west London.
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The blaze began just after midnight an electricity substation in Hayes, close to Heathrow Airport, with the travel hub remaining closed for most of Friday.
The incident saw a transformer catch fire, with London Fire Brigade Deputy Commissioner Jonathan Smith confirming the fire involved "a transformer containing 25,000 litres of cooling oil".
He added: "This created a major hazard owing to the still live high voltage equipment and the nature of an oil fuelled fire."
Met Commander Simon Messenger said the incident is now "believed to be non-suspicious".
