A large fire has hit a power plant near the airport in London Heathrow on the night between Thursday 20 and Friday 21 March, causing a blackout at the London airport. A fire that has led to the closure of the London airport until midnight today, at least for the moment.
The closure of London airport will cause severe disruption to passengers and thousands of tourists departing from the airport. In fact, an invitation to cancel all flights has been issued, which for the day amount to 1350 flights, with 300 passengers on the ground.
Specifically, many of these also concern connections to and from Italy which, according to the times of ItaliaRimborso, today amount to 56 direct flights from to Italy in connections with London Herthrow airport. Inconvenience therefore caused for approximately 11 thousand Italian passengers involved in connections with the airports of Naples, Rome Fiumicino, Florence, Bologna, Venice, Milan Linate and Milan Malpensa.
These disruptions may also cause additional disruption to passengers connecting from London to other destinations, such as the United States or Asia. Airlines are notifying passengers of cancellations or rerouting to other London airports.
Although the air carrier is not responsible for the disruption, and for this reason the passengers are not entitled to financial compensation (compensation for damages), according to European Regulation 261 of 2004, reimbursement of extra expenses incurred by the traveler to reach the pre-established destination is provided for, if the airline itself has not provided assistance to the passenger.
The passenger, therefore, upon receiving the notification of the flight cancellation, is free to accept or not the reproduction, if it is in the days following the scheduled travel date.
In this case, therefore, the passenger can purchase an alternative flight with another airline to reach their destination. A fundamental result in this process is to keep the original reservation of the flight to and from London Heathrow, but also all receipts, invoices and bills of the amount spent for the purchase of each means of transport to reach the intended destination.
“Passengers who will suffer disruptions to their flights due to the fire at London Heathrow airport – says Felice D'Angelo, CEO of ItaliaRimborso – can follow the provisions of European Regulation 261/2004 and subsequently request, if not re-protected by the air carrier, reimbursement of all costs incurred.
The aforementioned regulation is also valid within the London airport, which is no longer part of the European Union. This is in fact the case when the passenger involved in the disruption is travelling with a community carrier or in the case in which the disruption involves a non-European carrier departing from Italy. Travellers can make a request directly to the airline or a claims company, such as ours”.
Article published on March 21, 2025 - 15pm
I think the disruption caused by the fire is very serious and many passengers do not know what to do. It is important that airlines communicate well and quickly to travelers. We hope that everything will return to normal soon.