Britain’s government has ordered an investigation into the handling of a power outage that caused Europe’s busiest airport, Heathrow, to shut down for almost a day on Friday. The National Energy System Operator will lead the probe, which aims to assess the resilience of the country’s critical infrastructure.
Heathrow Airport has tasked an independent board member, former transport minister Ruth Kelly, with reviewing its crisis-management plan and response to the incident in order to boost its resilience. Despite the airport’s efforts to get back on track, airlines have issued travel waivers for affected passengers due to the significant disruption caused by the shutdown.
The power outage occurred at a nearby electrical substation, prompting an investigation led by London Fire Brigade. The fire had approximately 70 firefighters and 10 engines responding to it just before midnight on Thursday.
The incident has raised concerns about the reliability of Heathrow Airport, which was scheduled to handle over 290,000 passengers on Friday but saw many long-haul flights diverted due to the outage. Airlines have warned that the impact would be felt for days to come.
Source: https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/uk-orders-investigation-after-heathrow-airport-shutdown