Heathrow is today publishing a Winter Resilience Programme Update detailing the progress being made to ensure the airport is better prepared in the event of extreme winter weather.
Following the severe weather of December 2010, BAA asked Professor David Begg to chair an enquiry to establish how BAA, working with the airline community, NATS and the CAA, could increase Heathrow’s resilience to disruption in order to improve passengers’ experience of the airport. The Enquiry made 14 recommendations which BAA accepted and agreed to implement in full.
Today’s update comes six months after the publication of the Enquiry Report and details the work undertaken so far to implement the recommendations. The work has been grouped into three main areas: snow planning and preparation; crisis management command and control; and passenger welfare and information.
- Tripled the number of vehicles available for snow clearance compared to December 2010, with a total fleet of 185 vehicles.
- Increased the total number of staff available for snow clearance from 117 to 468 per shift.
- Introduced a new ‘Reservist’ role which will see up to 950 non-operational staff deployed to terminals to help passengers during disruption.
- Agreed with airlines, NATS and ACL (the company responsible for allocating slots at Heathrow) a new process for managing the necessary flight cancellations during disruption so that passengers receive more timely and accurate information about whether their flight is operating.
- Initiated plans for a new airport control centre.
- Improved the support and information we provide to passengers during disruption.
So far we have committed to investing £32.4 million in implementing the recommendations.
Normand Boivin, Chief Operating Officer of Heathrow, said: "Much has been done to improve Heathrow’s response to severe winter weather and there is more still to do.
"There will be lots of attention on Heathrow the next time it snows heavily. We won’t be perfect but we will be better, and we will improve each time we practise our new response plans.
There will still be times when for safety reasons airports have to close during severe weather, but the work detailed in today’s report means that this should happen less often at Heathrow and that the airport community responds better when it does."
Philip Langsdale, CIO and Winter Resilience Programme Director, said: "Heathrow Airport has worked constructively with airlines, air traffic control and other parties to implement the enquiry’s recommendations, and we are all determined to make further progress. The work done so far has taken the coordination and collaboration of many different organisations.
"Our priority has been to ensure we can be prepared for extreme weather ahead of the event so that we can better inform passengers and airlines of our plans. The work achieved so far will help us to serve passengers better at Heathrow on days when there isn’t snow just as much as on those rare occasions when there is."
