SWISS cancels flights to London’s Heathrow Airport after power station fire
The cancellation on Friday concerns a total of ten SWISS flights from Geneva and 14 flights from Zurich.
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Listening: SWISS cancels flights to London’s Heathrow Airport after power station fire
Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) says it has cancelled all flights from Geneva and Zurich to Heathrow Airport on Friday following a huge fire at a power sub-station which shut down London's main airport.
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Swiss annule ses vols à destination de Londres Heathrow
Original
The cancellation on Friday concerns a total of ten SWISS flights from Geneva with 944 passengers and 14 flights from Zurich with 1,969 passengers, the Lufthansa subsidiary said in a press release on Friday morning.
“As a precautionary measure, all flights from Switzerland to and from London Heathrow have been closed to sales for Saturday 22 March,” it added.
The London airport operator, Heathrow Airport Holdings, said it expected “serious (traffic) disruption over the next few days” due to the fire.
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Ranked among the world’s top five airports, Heathrow serves 80 countries and operates 1,300 take-offs and landings a day. It handles around 230,000 passengers a day.
For its part, London’s Gatwick Airport says it has begun to accept diverted flights.
Huge blaze
Heathrow Airport was shut on Friday after a huge fire at a nearby electrical substation wiped out its power, disrupting flight schedules around the world.
Around 70 firefighters were tackling the blaze in the west of London, which led to a mass power outage at Heathrow, Europe’s busiest and the world’s fifth-busiest airport, and also knocked out its back-up power system.
Huge orange flames and plumes of black smoke could be seen shooting into the sky. Around 150 people were evacuated from nearby buildings and thousands of properties were without power.
The fire brigade said the cause of the fire was not known.
Translated from French by DeepL/sb
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