Media in Pennsylvania
Heathrow airport has been closed and thousands of houses were left without electricity on Friday after a fire in a nearby power supply.
More than 1,300 flights have been canceled, passengers are invited not to go to the airport, and more than 150 people were moved from their home.
So what do we know about what didn’t work?
What caused the breakdown?
A fire at the North Hyde sub-station in Hayes, western London, caused the breakdown.
The firefighters were called to 23.23 GMT on Thursday and the fire was under control at 06:28 on Friday.
The cause of the fire is not yet known. The counter-terrorism police are conducting an investigation to find out if there was a unfair game.
Does Heathrow have rescue systems?
It is not yet known why a fire in a substation has closed Heathrow, the busiest airport in the United Kingdom, completely.
A national network source told the BBC that the airport had several energy sources, but that the fire had affected a “particularly important bit”.
Energy secretary Ed Miliband told BBC today’s program that the deputy rescue generator also seemed to have been “eliminated”.
A source that designs data centers, which require a quantity of electricity similar to Heathrow, told the BBC that he could not believe what happened at the airport.
Data centers have two supplies from the national grid and standby generators.
They also have batteries to cover electricity needs until generators can start.
We do not currently know why the rescue systems were not adequate.
Willie Walsh, Director General of the International Air Transport Association, which represents the airlines, said that there were “serious questions” about the breakdown.
“Firstly, how is the critical infrastructure – of the national and global importance – depends completely on a single source of food without alternative? If this is the case – as it seems – then it is a clear planning failure of the airport,” he said.
To what extent are Heathrow’s energy supplies resilient?
The BBC understands that the airport has a backup power for certain systems, but the kick -off of the alternative power supply for the entire airport takes time, and the systems must be verified to ensure that they are working properly.
However, Heathrow uses as much energy as a small town, it is therefore not possible to have the power to save itself to perform its operation safely.
A Heathrow source said the airport had rescue systems to face, for example, with a distress plane, but it does not have the capacity to manage the whole airport.
The source said that its safeguarding diesel generators and uninterrupted supplies in place all worked as planned.
The problem was with the national network, said the source, stressing that thousands of houses had been left without electricity, not just the airport.
There are two national grid stations near Heathrow: one in North Hyde, north of the airport, and one in Laleham, south of the airport, according to the Energy Analysis Company Montel Group.
It seems that only the North Hyde base is connected to Heathrow through the local distribution network, according to Phil Hewitt, director of Montel Analytics.
Although Heathrow has its own combined heat and power plant biomass, it seems that this cannot provide a complete backup capacity.
“This potential lack of resilience on a critical national and international infrastructure site is worrying,” said Hewitt. “An airport as large and as important as Heathrow should not be vulnerable to a single failure point.”
Robin Potter, a researcher at Chatham House, said Heathrow was one of the only two British airports – Gatwick is the other – which has a level of regulation around its resilience standards.
“These are in fact the best airports in the United Kingdom for the way their resilience is evaluated and regulated,” he said.
He added that in 2023, the National Infrastructure Commission recommended that the government have set standards for certain key sectors of infrastructure such as telecommunications, water, transport and energy by 2025.
He followed with another report at the end of last year, detailing how the government could do so for these sectors.
“These have been on the government’s office since October 2023,” he said.
When will the situation be resolved?
A national network source said that power should be back “in hours”, but said it was too early to say exactly when.
A Heathrow spokesperson said there was no “clarity at the moment when power can be restored reliably”.
There will be “significant disruptions in the coming days and passengers should in no case go to the airport until the airport reopens,” said the spokesperson.
“We know that it will be disappointing for passengers and we want to reassure that we work as hard as possible to resolve the situation.”
Report by Tom Espiner, Theo Leggett, Ben King, Oliver Smith and Simon Jack.
