Furious Americans rip aside Heathrow as they’re trapped the world over after airport meltdown: ‘We ought to by no means have come!’
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Furious Americans left stranded across the globe after a fire closed Heathrow Airport today have ripped apart Britain’s largest airport as they rush to get home.
Flights to and from Heathrow were canceled Friday after a massive blaze erupted at a nearby substation and knocked out power to the airport late last night.
At least 1,350 flights to and from Heathrow have been affected by the closure, with tens of thousands of passengers left stranded at airports overseas.
Dozens of planes from the US, the Caribbean and India were forced to be turned around in mid-air. Others were diverted to other airports in Britain and Europe.
Travelers have criticized Heathrow Airport and airline staff for their ‘confusing’ messages, with some alleging they weren’t informed their flights had been cancelled until they turned up at the airport today.
Others are outraged by the airline customer service helplines, which they allege are ‘busy’ and nearly impossible to reach a human being.
Some travelers have tried to make the most of the situation, even asking AI for vacation destination recommendations, but most say they ‘need to be home’ and are scrambling to make alternate travel plans.
Despite their desperate efforts to get back to the US, aviation experts warn the impact of massive inferno is likely to last several days as passengers try to reschedule their travel and airlines work to get planes and crew to the right places.
Blair Burton, who is travelling to Austin, Texas, waits for an update on her flight to Heathrow Airport on Friday near the British Airways counter at Fiumicino Airport in Rome
Carol Ye, from Canada, checks her phone as she waits to fly to Toronto on Friday. Ye, who is pictured at Fiumicino Airport in Rome today, was meant to fly via Heathrow International Airport in London, UK
At least 1,350 flights to and from Heathrow have been affected by the Heathrow Airport closure
Waiting at central London’s Paddington station, which normally offers express train service to Heathrow, Tyler Prieb contacted airlines this morning, desperately hoping to find a new flight back to his family in Nashville, Tennessee.
‘I’m sure everybody is going to need a new flight somewhere, somehow. So I’m just trying to get ahead of that the best I can,’ said Prieb, 36, who was in London for work and to see friends.
‘Hopefully, it will just take me an extra day to get back to my wife and my daughter. And they are probably wishing I would be home already,’ he said.
Prieb, however, did admit that he asked OpenAI‘s chatbot ChatGPT for ways to pass the time.
‘I thought maybe I’d go explore another city somewhere,’ he said.
John Moriarty, another American traveler, listened attentively to his phone’s speaker, hoping to get through to his airline’s customer service helpline.
The 75-year-old said he was anxious to return to Boston to see his daughter, who had travelled from New York to visit him.
‘All the lines are busy, so I might be here another day. Not the worst thing in the world. London is my favorite city, but I need to be home,’ he said.
Beau Mahr, a 21-year-old from Iowa, said that when they first arrived in London it was ‘very exciting and hopeful’, but says ‘now that we have to wait, it’s kind of stressful’.
American traveler Joanne Davis waits as she is trying to fly to Portland, Oregon, via Heathrow International Airport, at Fiumicino Airport near Rome, Italy, March 21, 2025
Eric Egert, 65, from Philadelphia, was diverted to Manchester airport after Heathrow Airport closed. He is looking for an onward flight to Ireland
Several passengers have expressed frustration at how poorly the airport has handled its communication with travelers today.
A man, who only shared his first name Ooso, who was expecting to fly to Miami for his son’s first day of college said instructions on the airport’s website were ‘confusing’.
Ooso had gone on foot with his suitcase from the roundabout outside Heathrow Terminal 5 to the airport, only to be told he could not enter.
He said as he walked back towards the roundabout: ‘The website shows ‘flight on time’. They only have a message not to come here, but to check updates.
‘Updates are showing ‘flight on time’, but nobody is allowed to go in. So, it’s so confusing.’
Speaking about his son, who he said is to begin a semester at Miami University, Ooso said: ‘He is to enroll on Monday.’
He added: ‘We would not have come had the website said, ‘flight cancelled’.’
A family from Dallas faced similar frustration after they were expected to fly back home to Texas from Heathrow but were told on arrival that the airport was closed.
London’s biggest terminals – which facilitates upwards of 200,000 travelers a day – were forced to shut down on Friday after a fire at a nearby substation caused a major power outage
Dramatic images show flames tearing through the structure as smoke billows into the night sky
Andrew Sri, his wife and their three young children, aged eight to one-year-old, had travelled to England to visit Andrew’s sister Andrea, who lives in Greenwich, east London.
‘I just wish they had updated us accordingly,’ Sri said as he and his family found themselves at a standstill on the terminal’s roundabout, waiting for updates.
‘At the moment, the schedule on our flight says it’s delayed, so that’s why we drove out. So now we’ve got here and they told us, ‘actually the airport’s been shut down’, so it’s a little bit disappointing.’
‘Obviously something happened and they’re taking precautions, and we understand that. We just wish we were given a heads-up warning not to come here.’
Ruben Cortez, 44, from Portland, Oregon arrived in the UK from South Africa this morning after carrying out missionary work in the country.
‘We just got an announcement saying we would not be landing in Heathrow and we would be landing… I don’t even know where we are at,’ he said.
‘We were told the airplane would be here until further notice and that we had to get off the plane and figure it out.’
When asked if they were going to fly from another neighboring airport, such as Luton, he replied: ‘Well, that’s what we are trying to find out, we can’t get them on the phone or anything.
‘I’ve been away from home for a while, so I just want to get back to the family.’
Ruben Cortez, 44, from Portland in Oregon had also arrived from South Africa after carrying out missionary work in the country
More than 200,000 passengers have had their flights to or from Heathrow cancelled on Friday after the airport announced it would be closed until 11.59pm as a result of the disruption.
Some 67,000 homes were left without power overnight and more than 100 people were evacuated after a transformer in a nearby electrical substation erupted into flames.
Residents described hearing a large explosion, followed by a fireball and clouds of smoke, when the blaze ripped through the electrical substation near the airport.
The London Fire Brigade sent 10 engines and around 70 firefighters to control the blaze and about 150 people were evacuated from their homes near the power station.
It was too early to determine what sparked the huge blaze, but there’s ‘no suggestion’ of foul play, UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said.
Counterterrorism detective are now leading the probe into the blaze amid claims it could be a Russian sabotage attack linked to Vladimir Putin‘s campaign of disruption.
London’s Met Police said the counterterrorism unit has taken lead on the case because of their ability to find the cause quickly and because of the location of the electrical substation fire and its impact on critical national infrastructure.
The fire – which took seven hours to control – also knocked out a backup power supply to the airport. Heathrow said in a statement that it had no choice but to close the airport for the day.
‘We expect significant disruption over the coming days, and passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until the airport reopens,’ an airport spokesperson said.
Smoke billowing from a substation supplying power to Heathrow Airport amid efforts to douse the remainder of the flames after a fire broke out in Hayes, west London on Friday
Road signs reading ‘access closed’ at the entrance of Heathrow airport following its closure after a fire broke out at a substation supplying power of the airport, in Hayes, west London
The fire’s widespread impact on travel led to criticism that Britain was ill prepared for disaster or some type of attack if a single blaze could shut down Europe’s busiest airport.
‘The UK’s critical national infrastructure is not sufficiently hardened for anywhere near the level it would need to be at to give us confidence this won’t happen again,’ said Alan Mendoza, the executive director of the Henry Jackson Society, a security think tank.
‘If one fire can shut down Heathrow’s primary systems and then apparently the backup systems, as well, it tells you something’s badly wrong with our system of management of such disasters.’
A spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer acknowledged that authorities had questions to answer and said a rigorous investigation was needed to make sure ‘this scale of disruption does not happen again.’
Though the fire has been brought under control, aviation experts warn the impact of the closure will be felt over two to four days as airlines, cargo carriers, and crews are moved into position and passengers rebooked.
‘As soon as the airport opens up at midnight tonight, it’s not only about resuming with tomorrow’s flights, it’s the backlog and the implications that have taken place,’ aviation consultant Anita Mendiratta said.
‘Crew and aircraft, many are not where they’re supposed to be right now. So the recalculation of this is going to be intense.’
