(London) London’s Heathrow airport, the main British connecting platform, is further thinning its flight program this summer: after dozens of cancellations on Monday, it announced on Tuesday that it would limit the number of departing passengers to 100 for two months. 000 per day, 4000 less than its forecast.
Posted at 10:30 a.m.
Like other British and European airports, which have been in chaos for several months with cancellations, delays, long queues or baggage delivery problems, Heathrow is struggling to absorb the resumption of demand, mainly due to of a lack of staff.
“On average, only around 1,500 of these 4,000 (cancelled) seats per day have already been sold, so we are asking our partner companies to stop selling air tickets for the summer to limit the impact for passengers. “Heathrow chief executive John Holland-Kaye said in a statement.
According to him, certain critical functions at the airport are still experiencing a significant lack of staff “in particular the ground staff employed by the airlines” to manage check-in or baggage handling in particular.
The day before, the airport had already canceled 61 flights, after having asked certain airlines, at the end of June, to reduce their flight planning.
Companies such as British Airways, Wizz Air or Easyjet have for their part recently canceled thousands of flights this summer to phase their programs with their reduced capacities.
They benefited in particular from a temporary relaxation of the rules governing take-off and landing slots this summer, an initiative of the British government to allow companies to adapt their planning without losing their rights for the following season.
But while some airlines “have taken significant action” following the easing, not all have played along, Heathrow criticizes on Tuesday, hence the new seat limit, in effect until September 11 , with the objective of “protecting flights for a vast majority of passengers”.
British airlines and airports, which had laid off thousands of people at the height of the pandemic, are now struggling to recruit.
Heathrow says it started recruiting in November and estimates that by the end of July it will have as many security employees as before the pandemic.