BAA has pledged to invest £50 million in response to an internal enquiry which criticised its handling of the severe winter weather in December.
The Winter Resilience Report, commissioned by BAA and authored by David Begg, revealed there were serious flaws in Heathrow’s response to the unusual conditions.
According to the Met Office, the weather in December was the coldest in 100 years, which led to an unusual level of snow fall and rare rate of accumulation – 7cm fell between 11 and noon on December 18.
The criticisms centred around a lack of equipment for clearing aircraft stands, and confused communication between the airport, airlines and passengers.
Heathrow Airport is of “critical importance to air transport in the UK and globally”, the enquiry panel stated in the report, and should adopt an “improved resilience target” that the airport never closes.
BAA has said it will take on all 14 actions that were reccommended in the Begg report, including better communication between key stakeholders.
Colin Matthews, BAA’s CEO, said: “I am pleased to have secured agreement from the CEOs of BA, Virgin Atlantic, BMI, NATS and the CAA to establish a Heathrow partnership for passengers.”
The group will meet regularly to “publicly reinforce Heathrow’s collective commitment to make every passenger’s journey better than the last one,” said Matthews.
“If the entire Heathrow community learns from this report,” he added, “and works more collaboratively to promote passengers’ interests, then this is a pivotal moment for the airport and its reputation.”
Virgin Atlantic welcomed the report’s findings. A spokeswoman said: “We are pleased at the pace of the inquiry and are not surprised by the heavy criticism levelled at BAA for failing to keep Heathrow open during that period of snowfall.
“As the world’s busiest airport and a vital gateway to the UK, the airline industry cannot allow this level of disruption to its customers to happen again.”
Matthews said BAA understands its role in keeping Heathrow open, but said it would need to work more closely with airlines to achieve this.
“Heathrow is among the most congested airports in the world and the lack of spare capacity means that unlike every other British or European airport, we have literally no room to move when disruption occurs,” he said.
“This means that any problem, large or small, that slows down the rate of aircraft arriving at or leaving from Heathrow, will disrupt many people.”
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