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London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

cnn.com

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Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#201

Post by Symbiote »

4ndrewl wrote: post #197
margalabargala wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, but it does include the time to get yourself and your vehicle on to and off of the train that carries vehicles through the Channel Tunnel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LeShuttle

Ye, I've been travelling on it since the first week it opened. But if you were redirected and had to fend for yourself you would need to book ahead on a tunnel or boat, hire a car to drive from France to Coquelles - find somewhere to drop the car, hire another car in the UK. All assuming you land in Paris in the morning early enough to do all this.

Then your comment about rowing across the sea is idiotic.

The airlines that redirected flights to Paris arranged buses to London.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#202

Post by mcintyre1994 »

crazygringo wrote: post #50
blindriver wrote: post #10

Seems like a national security issue if there’s a single point of failure a few miles away that can take down one of Europe’s largest airports and global air travel.

Why would it be a national security issue? Military airports are working fine. National security doesn't rely on civilian airports. And communications networks aren't disrupted or anything. This isn't enabling terrorism. It's absolutely a huge economic issue. Economic-political. But I'm not seeing a national security angle here.

Amusingly, some media outlets confused the Scandinavian SAS airline with Britain's SAS Special Forces unit, and reported that the special forces unit had cancelled its trips out of Heathrow :) https://amp.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2025/mar/21/hayes-s...

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#203

Post by t0mas88 »

belter wrote: post #190

An Helicopter, has been running multiple 360 degrees rounds, around the whole perimeter of Heathrow for the last two hours or three hours. I wonder if they are looking for something or somebody and there is more to this story. (click on the helicopter icon to see previous runs): https://www.flightradar24.com/GINTV/3990e5fc

That looks like a news reporting helicopter?

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#204

Post by Symbiote »

belter wrote: post #190

An Helicopter, has been running multiple 360 degrees rounds, around the whole perimeter of Heathrow for the last two hours or three hours. I wonder if they are looking for something or somebody and there is more to this story. (click on the helicopter icon to see previous runs): https://www.flightradar24.com/GINTV/3990e5fc

It's the BBC's news helicopter, according to the first result of a Google search. It's very easy to make these searches, and not invent conspiratorial nonsense.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#205

Post by 4ndrewl »

Symbiote wrote: post #201
4ndrewl wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ye, I've been travelling on it since the first week it opened. But if you were redirected and had to fend for yourself you would need to book ahead on a tunnel or boat, hire a car to drive from France to Coquelles - find somewhere to drop the car, hire another car in the UK. All assuming you land in Paris in the morning early enough to do all this.

Then your comment about rowing across the sea is idiotic. The airlines that redirected flights to Paris arranged buses to London.

Having thought about it you're correct. Even if you over inflate your tyres it won't provide enough buoyancy even for the smallest Euro-car.

An alternative reading to it 'being idiotic' is that it was clearly an exaggeration to prompt some critical thinking about the original claim.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#206

Post by 4ndrewl »

t0mas88 wrote: post #196
4ndrewl wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The Eurostar train from London to Paris takes only 2.5 hours. Much faster than driving.

In theory yes, but we were specifically talking about driving. And whilst 6 hours CDG to LHR is possible in theory (and I've done it a number of times), it does depend on a whole load of other factors that are not present compared to hiring a car at US airport 1 and driving to US airport 2.

Unless you're in the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#207

Post by margalabargala »

4ndrewl wrote: post #197
margalabargala wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, but it does include the time to get yourself and your vehicle on to and off of the train that carries vehicles through the Channel Tunnel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LeShuttle

Ye, I've been travelling on it since the first week it opened. But if you were redirected and had to fend for yourself you would need to book ahead on a tunnel or boat, hire a car to drive from France to Coquelles - find somewhere to drop the car, hire another car in the UK. All assuming you land in Paris in the morning early enough to do all this.

Yes, all of which could be done in hours less time than it would take to get from Atlanta to any comparable airport.

Consider the amount of train/ferry transit between London and Paris. That doesn't exist in the US. Rental car companies don't keep that much extra stock on hand, and really do not love renting cars for inter-state one-way journeys.

I categorically reject that getting from Atlanta to London with ATL nonoperational would be either faster or easier than getting from London to Atlanta with LHR nonoperational.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#208

Post by 4ndrewl »

margalabargala wrote: post #207
4ndrewl wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ye, I've been travelling on it since the first week it opened. But if you were redirected and had to fend for yourself you would need to book ahead on a tunnel or boat, hire a car to drive from France to Coquelles - find somewhere to drop the car, hire another car in the UK. All assuming you land in Paris in the morning early enough to do all this.

Yes, all of which could be done in hours less time than it would take to get from Atlanta to any comparable airport. Consider the amount of train/ferry transit between London and Paris. That doesn't exist in the US. Rental car companies don't keep that much extra stock on hand, and really do not love renting cars for inter-state one-way journeys. I categorically reject that getting from Atlanta to London with ATL non…

Fair enough if you categorically reject it. That's good enough for me.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#209

Post by margalabargala »

4ndrewl wrote: post #206
t0mas88 wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Eurostar train from London to Paris takes only 2.5 hours. Much faster than driving.

In theory yes, but we were specifically talking about driving. And whilst 6 hours CDG to LHR is possible in theory (and I've done it a number of times), it does depend on a whole load of other factors that are not present compared to hiring a car at US airport 1 and driving to US airport 2. Unless you're in the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

I brought up driving to illustrate the incorrectness of the original claim, the person I replied to did not mention driving. The person you replied to is correct to bring up the EuroStar option.

By the way, the snide remarks you add to the end to each of your comments may be better suited for a place like Reddit or TruthSocial. The community standards guidelines for HN can be found at the bottom of the page.

Re: London's Heathrow Airport announces complete shutdown due to power outage

#210

Post by leoedin »

seabass-labrax wrote: post #124
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All right, but if Heathrow was down for a day, what would you do? Cancel the trip, and never go at all? Or would you go a day later, or through a different airport, or fly to Manchester and take the train?

Even if the airline let you, why would you travel to Manchester ? That's half a day and a £100 train fare away from London. There's still Gatwick, Stansted and Luton in 'London', plus Cardiff, Birmingham and Bristol as alternatives. If money were no object even Amsterdam Schiphol or Brussels would make for a faster journey than Manchester!

By what basis are Brussels or Amsterdam closer to London from Manchester? Manchester is a 2 hour train ride from London. Brussels is similar, but there’s at least an hour of mandatory security and waiting. Amsterdam is much further away.
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