Flights heading to London from Calgary were cancelled Thursday night as Heathrow Airport shut down due to a power outage caused by a large fire.
The London hub is one of the world’s busiest airports, so the closure is expected to have a domino effect on thousands of others, including Calgary International Airport.
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Among Calgary’s immediate flight cancellations were a WestJet flight bound for Heathrow, which was cancelled prior to taking off and another plane that needed to be alerted in mid-air.
Air Canada flight AC850, heading to London, was already over James Bay when the airport suddenly closed.
The plane left YYC around 7 p.m. and was forced to turn around a few hours later near the Quebec border.
A British couple CTV News spoke to at YYC said they were trying to get home, but the shutdown has made it impossible for the time being.
“We had a lovely smooth flight until we were somewhere over Manitoba when the captain came on to say the airport in Heathrow had had an incident,” the passenger said.
“Luckily, they had given out free Wi-Fi on this flight so we were able to find out from our daughter that there’d been a fire.”
John Gill, who was also on a flight destined for Heathrow was turned around and sent back to Calgary.
“Of course, in the moment we were worried something bad had happened,” he said.
“Now I have to go home and probably scare my wife when I head into the house because she’ll be surprised that I’m back so soon, so that should be eventful!”
The flight also cut big trips by a full day for Calgarian passenger like Brad Bonnell, who was looking forward to visiting London for the very first time.
“We were halfway across the country and all of a sudden we get this message on the loudspeaker, we were all so confused and kind of wondering what was happening,” he said.
“So yes, it’s frustrating because I was going to England for a full week and now, I lose a full day so hopefully I can get rebooked quick and have the problem resolved.”
Heathrow blacked out
Heathrow officials said a large fire at a nearby electrical substation triggered the power outage and resulting closure.
While speaking on Sky News, Britain’s energy secretary described it as a catastrophic fire that had also affected backup systems.
Heathrow Airport has slowly begun to reopen, resuming some flights late Friday.
The airport had been due to handle 1,351 flights, flying up to 291,000 passengers, but planes were diverted to other airports in Britain and across Europe, while many long-haul flights returned to their point of departure.
Heathrow said there would be a limited number of flights on Friday, mostly focused on relocating aircraft and bringing planes into London.
“Tomorrow morning, we expect to be back in full operation, to 100 per cent operation as a normal day,” said Heathrow chief executive Thomas Woldbye.
“What I’d like to do is to apologise to the many people who have had their travel affected ...we are very sorry about all the inconvenience.”
Shutdown creates passenger backlog
According to Flight Radar, this is impacting more than a thousand flights worldwide.
Aviation experts say a quarter million passengers fly through Heathrow each day, and the resulting backlog from this closure will take at least a week to fix.
Air Canada and WestJet both have late-night flights to London, leaving late Friday evening.
In a statement sent to CTV News Friday morning, Air Canada said it needed to cancel seven flights to London.
Six of those were in the air and had to return while a seventh was cancelled before taking off.
“This included three from Toronto, and one each from Montreal, Calgary and our Delhi-London-Calgary flight. Including return flights by those aircraft from London, the total cancelled is 16,” the statement reads.
Air Canada had to cancel its morning flight from Halifax to London.
“We are waiting for more information from Heathrow to determine when the airport will reopen and how many flights we will be permitted to operate this evening. For this evening, we have six flights scheduled, three from Toronto, and one each from Calgary, Montreal and Vancouver.”
The airline says it is rerouting passengers to other European destinations, but they are limited on space.
Meanwhile, WestJet has also had to cancel one of its flights arriving to Calgary Friday evening from London Heathrow (WS19) along with a recovery flight that was set to depart from Calgary to London Heathrow (WS4120) at 8:20 p.m.
In a statement to CTV News, WestJet says it has been advised that London Heathrow plans to reopen at 6 a.m. March 22, as power has been restored to parts of the airport.
“Normal service levels are anticipated as operations resume, though congestion is expected,” read the statement.
“Unfortunately, WestJet’s proposed recovery flights that would have reaccommodated guests affected by this incident (WS4120 YYC-LHR on March 21 and WS4121 LHR-YYC on March 23) will not operate, as we were unable to acquire additional landing slots for these flights due to the backlog at LHR.”
WestJet did confirm however that one of its flights to London Heathrow (WS18) from Calgary will operate as planned (WS18) scheduled to depart at 10:10 p.m.
Both Air Canada and WestJet have advised concerned travellers over the next few days to check the status of their flight online before heading to the airport.
Calgary’s airport prepared for emergencies
In the wake of a major fire that shut down power to Europe’s largest travel hub, Calgary’s International Airport says it has several safety protocols in place should a major event like this occur at its facility.
“We’ve got a very robust electrical infrastructure, so into every part of our building, we’ve got three points of power: we’ve got a primary source, a secondary source, and then we’ve got a backup, which is a generator,” said Chris Miles, chief operating officer for the Calgary International Airport.
“So in the international terminal building, there’s three separate sources that come into this building. We’ve got three separate sources that go into our domestic building, and we’ve got the ability to power each part of the building off each other, so domestic can power international or vice versa, and that extends out to our airfield as well.”
Miles adds that his team tests each power source monthly to ensure all generators come online without interruption, noting that dedicated emergency response members from the airport are consistently trained for crisis situations.
‘Key flaws in air passenger protection’
The major shutdown of London Heathrow has left thousands of Canadian travellers stranded, prompting some air passenger rights advocates to voice concerns.
Gábor Lukács, president and founder of Air Passenger Rights, says that passengers who are flying from the United Kingdom to other countries have a “gold standard” of protections, but that’s not the case if you’re travelling from Canada.
“So if you’re coming from the UK, the airline has to book you on the next available flight whenever that may happen and provide you with meals and accommodation regardless of an ‘act of God’ like events and that’s one very important distinction between the European Union gold standard and the Canadian rules,” Lukács said.
“If you have the misfortune flying from Canada via Heathrow, then only Canada’s subpar inferior air passenger protection regulations would apply.
“You get no meals, no accommodation, and the airline has to rebook you on a next available flight of its own or partner airlines that departs within 48 hours of the original departure time showing on your ticket.”
Lukács adds that if a flight isn’t available within 48 hours from Canada to the United Kingdom, then the original airline an individual booked with will have to get them a ticket on a next available flight from a competitor.
“This situation really highlights and brings the forefront some of the key flaws in the air passenger protection regulation, something that we have been flagging now for more than six years,” he said.
“Airlines are engaging in massive lobbying effort to undermine passenger protection in Canada. It may not be as important as the trade war currently going on, but it matters to us, and we want members of Parliament to listen to us during this next election.”
