Power outage, fire at London Heathrow affecting at least 30 Schiphol flights so far

A fire that resulted in a power outage affecting London Heathrow Airport on Friday is also impacting flights at Schiphol Airport just outside of Amsterdam in Haarlemmermeer. A Schiphol spokesperson told media outlets on Friday morning that 15 flights to and from the London airport had been scrapped. Heathrow Airport, the largest and busiest in Europe, will be closed at least until midnight, according to European air traffic center Eurocontrol.

The power outage was caused by a fire in a transformer station that supplies the airport with electricity. By 8:10 a.m., the Schiphol website only showed 11 canceled flights, five departures to and seven arrivals from London Heathrow. About 30 flights were scheduled to travel between Schiphol and Heathrow today, with half traveling in each direction. The route is mainly split between KLM and British Airways operations on most Fridays during this season.

Some flights already in the air were rerouted to nearby facilities, including seven flights which were diverted to Schiphol. This includes Delta flights from Detroit, Boston, and Atlanta, two Cathay Pacific flights from Hong Kong, a British Airways flight from Riyadh, and a Malaysia Airlines flight from Kuala Lumpur.

Eindhoven Airport was unable to take any diverted flights on Friday "due to noise restrictions and limited available aircraft stands," according to Eurocontrol. None of the affected flights were diverted to the other commercial airports in the Netherlands. "Please be aware that some European airports are now reporting limited diversion capacity especially for wide-body aircraft."

KLM canceled three roundtrip pairings involving Heathrow Airport. “That makes a total of six flights,” a spokesperson for the Dutch airline told ANP. Affected travelers will be rebooked on flights from Saturday. For people who “really need to be in London today,” KLM will try to find space on flights going to airports near the British capital, the spokesperson said.

The Eurostar train between the two capitals is another option, but he direct Eurostar trains departing Amsterdam’s Central Station for London St. Pancras were largely sold out, according to the website for Dutch national railway NS. Some indirect routes included available seats ranging from 300 to 500 euros per ticket.

The route between the two airports is considered one of the busiest European routes by passenger volume, with Heathrow being the largest airport in Europe, and Schiphol being the fourth largest on the continent and second in the European Union. Of the 66.8 million passengers who traveled through Schiphol Airport last year, the plurality involved originating airports and destinations within the United Kingdom.