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Over 1,500 passengers were diverted to Shannon Airport on six flights todayA total of 34 flights were cancelled between Dublin Airport and Heathrow todayAer Lingus is planning to operate its ‘normal schedule’ to and from London Heathrow tomorrow
All flights between Irish airports and Heathrow were cancelled today, with further disruption possible over the coming days.
Flights resumed at London Heathrow this evening, focused mainly on the relocation of aircraft before the airport is expected to return to “full operation” tomorrow, airport chief executive Thomas Woldbye said.
More than 30 flights were cancelled between Irish airports and Heathrow following a fire at a nearby electrical substation that knocked out the airport’s power supply.
Over 1,300 flights and up to 291,000 passengers were affected overall by the closure.
British police said counter-terrorism officers were investigating, but there was no initial indication of foul play in the substation fire.
The blaze, which was reported just after 11pm on Thursday night, forced planes to divert to airports across Europe.
Over 1,500 passengers were diverted to Shannon Airport on six flights today from Toronto, Atlanta, Bridgetown Barbados, Boston, Orlando and Newark, while a total of 34 flights were cancelled between Dublin Airport and Heathrow.
Tánaiste Simon Harris paid tribute to teams that worked to get flights “back up and running” at the airport last night following “travel chaos”.
“Obviously the route between Dublin and Heathrow is the second busiest route in Europe, and therefore that caused a significant challenge today for commuters to and from Dublin in relation to Heathrow,” he said.
“But it does seem that everything that could have been done to try and swiftly get things back on track has happened and I’m grateful to all of those involved in making that happen.”
Up to 120 aircraft were heading to Heathrow from airports across the world when the fire began and were forced to either divert or return to their point of origin. Passengers on board Qantas flights to Heathrow from Singapore and Perth diverted to Paris before taking buses to London.
The disruption, which is the largest to air travel since the Icelandic ash cloud of 2010, has prompted questions about the potential vulnerability of such critical infrastructure and the contingency planning in place.
A spokesperson for the airport said it hopes to return to a “full operation” tomorrow as it works to repatriate the passengers who were diverted across Europe.
“Our priority remains the safety of our passengers and those working at the airport. As the busiest airport in Europe, Heathrow uses as much energy as a small city, therefore getting back to a full and safe operation takes time,” they said.
The closure is expected to have days-long knock-on effects globally, leaving many passengers stranded as carriers reconfigure their networks to move planes and crews around.
However, Aer Lingus is planning to operate its “normal schedule” to and from London Heathrow tomorrow, after all services were cancelled today, affecting around 5,500 passengers.
A spokesperson for the airline said it had communicated with all impacted customers, and customer care teams were working hard to “provide them with the options available to them, including applying for refunds, changing flights without a change fee applying,, or, if a customer has an imminent requirement to travel, engaging them directly with our customer care team to arrange re-accommodation where possible”.
Ryanair, which does not operate routes into London Heathrow, added eight extra flights between Dublin and London Stansted to its schedule as a result of the closure, including four flights tomorrow.
A spokesperson said these flights were intended to “rescue passengers” affected by the closure of Heathrow Airport.
Seats were still available on Ryanair flights last night, with one-way fares from Dublin to London Stansted priced between €140 and €262 for flights travelling tomorrow.
One-way tickets on Sunday were still available for morning and evening departure times, with fares priced between €257 and €305.
In an update, Sean Doyle, the chief executive of British Airways, the biggest carrier at Heathrow, described the situation at Heathrow as “unprecedented” and warned that there will be a “substantial impact” on the airline and its customers “for many days to come” as it navigated a number of logistical issues as a result of the closure.
More than 670 British Airways flights were cancelled today, impacting 107,000 passengers.
“We have flight and cabin crew colleagues and planes that are currently at locations where we weren’t planning on them to be,” Mr Doyle said.
UK prime minister Keir Starmer’s spokesman said there would be a thorough investigation into the incident.
Heathrow, and London’s other major airports, have been hit by other outages in recent years, most recently by an automated gate failure and an air traffic system meltdown, both in 2023.