Heathrow’s chief executive has said it could cost about £1 billion to install a more “resilient” power system to help avoid a repeat of the outage that forced the airport’s closure last week, and warned airlines could end up paying through higher charges.
In his first detailed explanation of the disruption which involved the cancellation of more than 1,300 flights, Thomas Woldbye defended Heathrow’s handling of the outage, but admitted he was “frustrated” that he was asleep as the crisis unfolded.
He told the Financial Times he was convinced the airport had no choice but to close in the early hours of Friday morning last week on safety grounds. He accepted Heathrow needed to review whether it could have been more nimble and reopened more quickly, which could have minimised the chaos that affected more than 200,000 travellers.
“It’s a relevant question,” Mr Woldbye said. “And I’ll start out by saying that, you know, we don’t profess to be 100 per cent perfect.”
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Heathrow closed after a massive fire at a nearby electricity substation caused a power outage at the airport. Flights bound for Europe’s busiest hub had to divert to other airports, and Heathrow did not fully reopen until more than 24 hours later.
The scrutiny on Heathrow deepened after John Pettigrew, chief executive of National Grid, which operates the UK’s high-voltage transmission network, said power had always been available to the airport from two other nearby substations which were unaffected by the blaze.
The delay in reopening the airport was caused by Heathrow’s engineers having to reconfigure its power supply to take electricity from the other two substations, and then test that all its critical safety systems were working properly.
Mr Woldbye said the airport would now assess whether it is possible to install a “fully resilient” power system which would allow it to quickly switch between power sources. He said it was not clear if this was possible, but that it might cost upwards of £1 billion if it is.
Other options include buying more generators to power more of the airport during outages. Heathrow’s current diesel generators only power safety-critical parts of the operation such as the control tower during outages.
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The airport’s regulatory model allows it to recoup its capital expenditure from the landing charges it levies on airlines, which are ultimately passed through to passengers in ticket prices.
Mr Woldbye said Heathrow faced a balancing act as it assesses how much the airport should spend on improving its resilience. “We need to look at our resilience...but how far up the supply chain do we need to go, and how much would that cost?” he added.
“That’s a dialogue we have to have with our airlines, because they are deeply involved in our investments...which has an influence on our charges. That’s a very big discussion.” – Copyright The Financial Times
