More than 1,300 flights to and from Heathrow airport will be disrupted on Friday due to the closure of the airport following a fire at a nearby electrical substation.
Thousands of homes have been left without power and more than 100 people were evacuated after a transformer within the North Hyde electrical substation caught fire in west London.
Thousands of Irish passengers are likely to be affected by the closure with at least 10 flights from Dublin to the hub airport facing disruption.
The airport, which is supplied by the substation, said it was among those impacted by the power outage.
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Online flight tracking service FlightRadar24 said the closure would affect at least 1,351 flights to and from Heathrow.
It said 120 flights to the airport were in the air when the closure was announced.
[ Heathrow airport closure: How are Irish passengers affected?Opens in new window ]
Heathrow is the UK’s largest airport, with more than 83.9 million passengers travelling through its terminals in 2024.
A Heathrow spokesperson said: “Heathrow is experiencing a significant power outage across the airport due to a large fire at a nearby electrical substation. Whilst fire crews are responding to the incident, we do not have clarity on when power may be reliably restored.
“To maintain the safety of our passengers and colleagues, we have no choice but to close Heathrow until 23h59 on 21 March 2025. We expect significant disruption over the coming days and passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until the airport reopens.
“We will provide an update when more information on the resumption of operations is available. We know this will be disappointing for passengers and we want to reassure that we are working as hard as possible to resolve the situation.”
Online tracking services showed flights being diverted to Gatwick, Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris and Ireland’s Shannon Airport.
Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks said on X there was a large-scale power outage in Hayes, Hounslow and the surrounding areas impacting more than 16,300 homes.
A National Grid spokesperson said the fire had damaged equipment and they “working at speed to restore power supplies as quickly as possible”.
London Fire Brigade said 10 fire engines and around 70 firefighters were on the scene at Nestles Avenue in Hayes.
Around 150 people have been evacuated from surrounding properties and a 200m (656ft) cordon has been put in place as a precaution.
Firefighters led 29 people from surrounding properties to safety.
Footage posted to social media showed huge flames and large plumes of smoke coming from the facility.
The fire brigade said nearly 200 calls had been received in relation to the incident with crews from Hayes, Heathrow, Hillingdon, Southall and surrounding areas on the scene.
Emergency services were called to the scene at 11.23pm on Thursday. The cause of the fire is yet to be determined. – PA
