Transport Secretary: Heathrow fire an 'unprecedented' crisis
Video Credit: ODN - Duration: 01:17s - Published
Transport Secretary: Heathrow fire an 'unprecedented' crisis
Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander called the Heathrow substation fire an "unprecedented event of very significant magnitude" after it halted flights for 18 hours.
She praised firefighters and staff for their response, noting backup generators kept critical systems running but couldn’t power the entire airport.
The government and Heathrow have launched investigations into resilience planning and infrastructure lessons.
Report by Covellm.
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The boss of Heathrow Airport says he is “absolutely committed” to ensuring lessons are learnt from the events which led to the closure of Europe’s busiest airport last month. Appearing before MPs on the Transport Select Committee, Thomas Woldbye also offered a ‘sincere apology’ for the travel disruption caused to thousands of passengers during the one-day shutdown.
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Simon Gallagher, founder of UK Network Services, said Heathrow could have had enough power from one live substation during the outage, but it would have taken hours to reconfigure the airport's network. He acknowledged National Grid’s point that there was sufficient capacity but stressed Heathrow's challenge in adjusting to use that power in time. Report by Covellm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
Akhil Vyas, a passenger caught up in Friday’s Heathrow Airport closure, recalled the moment he learned his flight to Dubai for a family holiday was cancelled. He said that he hopes that Heathrow will learn from the incident and create a contingency plan to prevent future disruptions. Report by Covellm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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