Terminal 5 (Heathrow)

[stogie bear]

Disruption at T5 enters third day...

Stranded passengers unable to find accommodation slept in the airport

Passengers at Heathrow's new Terminal 5 face disruption for the third day running, with flight cancellations due to continue through the weekend.

British Airways said it expects another 54 short-haul flights will be cancelled on Saturday, followed by 37 on Sunday.

More than 100 flights at the new £4.3bn terminal were called off on Thursday and Friday because of earlier glitches with the baggage-handling systems...

1. 0400 - Both passengers and staff have trouble locating car parks
2. 0400 - Delayed opening of check-in results in long queues
3. 0442- First passengers arrive early but wait an hour for luggage
4. All morning - Clogged conveyor leads to long wait for luggage
5. 1630 - Baggage system failure; all check-in at T5 suspended
6. 1700 - After long queues form at "fast bag drop" desk, BA suspends check-in of all luggage into hold

Funny how Thailand can open up an entire major (and massive) international airport without too many snags and the UK can't even open a part of one of it's multitude of international airports without major problems

It's time that the scamming idiots that run BAA were removed and the airports were once again under more federal supervision.

BA must be laughing as they save thousands of tons of fuel and that crappy airline doesn't give a fuck about customers anyway.

[mardhi]

Unfortunately its a sign of BA's total arrogance in the market place that they feel so superior and smug about everything - this change has been happening for last 10 years - BA used to be run by people who understood service and all it stands for - now its run by clowns who have been to business school, yet have no idea how a business operates in the real world. A shame really its happened but its not unexpected. I feel sorry not just for the passengers but all the front line staff who take the brunt of the complaints yet the managers are off in a huddle meeting devising new plans on how to drive the business further into the ground instead of thinking, hey what are we doing to actually make this thing work.

Welcome to British business management in the 21st century.

Cheers
Mardhi

[terryw]

To be fair to BA at least they have apologised to their customers and are trying to sort out the mess.

Heathrow T5 is actually owned by BAA (British Airports Authority) which despite the name is a Spanish owned company. They have yet to take any responsibility for their poor management and appear to be avoiding speaking to the media. During the past couple of years there have been a catalogue of incidents at several BAA owned airports which are entirely due to poor management.

BAA's parent company Ferroval is heavily in debt and will almost certainly have to sell some of its UK assets to pay off some of their loans. We will probably find in the next few days alot of stories about how BAA have cut corners to save money at T5.

Fortunately my local airports are Manchester and Liverpool which are UK owned and both are efficiently run.

[rxpharm]

When Suvarnabhumi opened they also had problems with the baggage handling system for the first few days - the gov't called out the army to help with things until the system was sorted. Senior management staff were also enlisted.

[harley quinn]

Listening to the radio reports on opening day as I sat in traffic watching the rain, it seemed that the biggest complaint was that at the first sign of trouble all the BA and BAA staff that should have been dealing with things vanished. The only people left were a gang of school leavers and part timers wearing T-shirts saying "ask me".

This seems pretty typical that the corporate cannon fodder get left to hold the can and the powers that be bugger off.

Based on this shambles the opening ceremony for the 2012 Olympics should be one for the history books.

[katoeylover]

FFS - have the press got nothing better to report on than a few lost bags and a few internal flights cancelled? What would they have said if nothing had gone wrong - NOTHING. 'cos it wouldnt have made the news!!

Its like the BBC were waiting for this to happen so they could just jump on the bandwagon and have a go at BA.

This is a state of the art facility, give it a week and it will be working fine.

[stogie bear]

You've been reading the BAA Gazette! It's a lot more than a 'few missing bags!'

[allstar88]

just wait till we get the olympics just been to paris cdg airport which is total chaos,anyone going to paris cdg avoid treminal 2b and easy jet

[Guest]

One of the rules which I have now followed for ten years and despite living in the SE England.....Avoid Heathrow Airport
Is once again vindicated

Anyway, Heathrow is not in England, it is a suburb of Bombay  About half a million members of the Indian community rely on that area for their livelihood.

[stogie bear]

the gov't called out the army to help with things until the system was sorted...

What a smart rational and sensible thing to do.

The BAA probably called a meeting with spin doctors out of work since Bliar fled.

[buttafly]

(rxpharm @ Mar. 29 2008,17:30) When Suvarnabhumi opened they also had problems with the baggage handling system for the first few days -

right, not sure where SB came up with his take on the new BKK airport, hell even *I* [and thousands of others] had growing pains with that new craphole for a while..... also, it's kinda far from BKK now [but closer to the sewer city] and takes a fucking long time to walk between gates!

Going to in summer but not using BA so this won't affect me....I hope

[stogie bear]

A Buttafly in the UK... That's a scary thought!

[Guest]

I would just like to know why the guys who designed, built and then fitted out both Heathrow's new T5 and Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi could not have consulted with the people who produced Singapore's luxurious, yet very practical Changi airport.
That place sets a magnificent standard, three hour lay overs there are almost a pleasure

Then again, maybe Changi was designed with transit passengers very much in mind.

[allstar88]

(pentire @ Mar. 29 2008,19:43) One of the rules which I have now followed for ten years and despite living in the SE England.....Avoid Heathrow Airport
Is once again vindicated  

Anyway, Heathrow is not in England, it is a suburb of Bombay     About half a million members of the Indian community rely on that area for their livelihood.

why are all the workers at heathrow asian? are they poor paid jobs that whites wont do or do the asians have the monopoly on the jobs  or is the local population all asian?

[buttafly]

(stogie bear @ Mar. 29 2008,20:35) A Buttafly in the UK... That's a scary thought!

been there already, to Ulster ..... great weather!!


this time hitting the "Big" island.....can't wait, never been there

But remember, this ol' buttafly has hid his wings clipped .... just a boring ol' fart now, the name should be passed on to a younger gent who still wants to fuck every day! {Errr.... I USED to want that, getting old sucks!}

Maybe see ya there SB, and try to get Tomcat to go out on the prowl as well, eh??