The fire that forced London Heathrow airport to shut down today has sparked travel chaos across the globe, with tens of thousands of passengers left stranded at airports overseas.
At least 1,350 flights to and from Heathrow have been affected, data from flight tracking service FlightRadar24 has revealed.
Dozens of planes from the US, the Caribbean and India were forced to be turned around in mid-air. Others were diverted to Gatwick Airport outside London, Charles de Gaulle Airport near Paris or Ireland’s Shannon Airport, tracking services showed.
Some 120 flights were in the air when the closure was announced early this morning. Out of these, 36 were still in the air four hours later as pilots – mainly flying from Asia – scrambled to work out where they could land.
The impact of the 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.
Authorities do not know what caused the electrical substation fire, but so far found have no evidence it was suspicious.
Counter terrorism police 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.
As one of the world’s busiest airports, handling around 1,300 landings and take-offs each day, disruption caused by Heathrow’s closure has quickly spread to other countries.
At least 1,350 flights to and from Heathrow have been affected by the Heathrow Airport closure
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
A visibly upset German woman cries at Heathrow Terminal 5 this morning as she and her travel companion learn their plans have been disrupted
Passengers from as far away as San Francisco, and Perth in Australia were caught in the carnage, with data firm Cirium estimating that 290,000 people who were scheduled to fly to or from the airport will be affected.
Dozens of flights have been diverted to Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Lyon and other European cities, stranding tens of thousands of people abroad.
Some planes were even forced to turn back and set down in New York, Los Angeles, Mumbai and Delhi – where Air India has now cancelled all its flights to London.
Meanwhile, all 34 flights scheduled from Dublin to Heathrow today have been axed.
With many airports already operating at capacity, finding alternative places for flights to land is not always easy.
FlightRadar data reveals a mishmash of different outcomes, with passengers on a flight from Bangkok diverted to Brussels and those flying from New York City heading to Iceland.
A flight from Boston was sent to Goose Bay Airport in Canada, while others have been sent to Ireland, Munich, Frankfurt, Madrid, or other UK airports including Cardiff and Manchester.
Dramatic images show flames tearing through the structure as smoke billows into the night sky
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
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 the North Hyde Electrical substation last night. Pictured are parked planes at Heathrow Terminal 5
One group of passengers who have been impacted by today’s Heathrow chaos had flown in on British Airways flight (BA56) from Johannesburg, which had been due to connect to a string of other destinations including the USA and Italy.
Qantas airlines diverted flights from Singapore and Perth, Australia to Paris, where it said it would bus people to London, a process likely to also include a train shuttle beneath the English Channel.
European airports are expected to receive an influx of planes that are too far into their journeys to turn back.
Amsterdam, Newfoundland in Canada and Helsinki are among some of the cities accepting diverted flights.
Travelers who were diverted to other cities found themselves trying to book travel onward to London.
Budget airline Ryanair, which doesn’t operate out of Heathrow, said it added eight ‘rescue flights’ between Dublin and London’s Stansted airport to transport stranded passengers Friday and Saturday.
Britain’s National Rail service also canceled all trains to and from Heathrow.
Passengers on a flight from Perth in Australia queue up at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport after having their 17 hour flight diverted away from Heathrow
A departure board at Singapore’s Changi Airport showing cancelled flights to Heathrow
People wait by the Eurostar departure gates at St. Pancras International Station, after a fire at electrical substation wiped out power at the Heathrow International Airport, in London, Britain, March 21, 2025
Joanne Davis from US waits as she is trying to fly to Portland, Oregon, via Heathrow International Airport, after a fire at an electrical substation wiped out the power at Heathrow International Airport, at Fiumicino Airport near Rome, Italy, March 21, 2025
Travelers Lauren Clark, left, and Shahin Jade Ali, right, wait at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport after a fire at Heathrow Airport in London forced its closure, leading to numerous flight cancellations, in Mumbai, India
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.
London’s Met Police said counterterrorism detectives were leading the investigation 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.
A traveler arrives at Heathrow Airport after receiving a message that her flight to Dubai was still scheduled to depart on March 21, 2025 in London, England. All flights to and from the airport have been cancelled due to the fire
Passengers board a bus as trains to Heathrow Airport are terminated, at Hatton Cross in London, on Friday
Workers on the way of investigate electrical substation following a fire at an electrical substation supplying power to the facility, in London on March 21, 2025
A police officer and firefighters near the North Hyde electrical substation which caught fire
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.’
Tom Wells, a spokesperson for Prime Minister 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.’
A traveler walks outside the Terminal 4 at Heathrow International Airport after a fire at a nearby electrical substation wiped out the power at the airport on Friday
A traveller arrives with his luggage at Terminal 4 as Britain’s Heathrow Airport has closed for the full day Friday
Passengers leave Indira Gandhi International Airport after their flight scheduled for London got cancelled over a Heathrow Airport shutdown, in New Delhi, India on Friday
Heathrow is one of the busiest airports in the world for international travel. The airport serves more than 230 destinations in nearly 90 countries.
Ninety airlines have made Heathrow their base, including British Airways, Virgin Atlantic and Lufthansa.
It had its busiest January on record earlier this year, with more than 6.3 million passengers – up more than 5 per cent from the same period last year.
According to traffic summary, 5.7 million passengers travelled through Heathrow in February 2025, making it the busiest February on record. Passenger numbers amounted to 84.1 million from March 2024 to February 2025.
Still, the disruption Friday fell short of the one caused by the 2010 eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano, which spewed clouds of ash into the atmosphere and created trans-Atlantic air travel chaos for months.
Heathrow – where the UK government plans to build a third runway – was also at the heart of a shorter disruption in 2023 when Britain’s air traffic control system was hit by a breakdown that slowed takeoffs and landings across the UK on one of the busiest travel days of the year.
