20,000 Bags Delayed at Heathrow’s New Terminal 5
Travel Blog • Michael Yessis • 04.01.08 | 12:17 PM ET
Unfortunately, it’s not another April Fool’s Day joke. Since opening March 27, Terminal 5 at London’s Heathrow Airport has been a disaster. One of the major issues: The $8.5 billion automated luggage system failed to work as promised.
It’s gotten so bad officials have called in FedEx to help reunite those 20,000 bags with passengers.
“We had no reason to believe that the plans for T-5 would not work,” Britain’s aviation minister Jim Fitzpatrick said. “It is a matter of considerable disappointment, it has dented national pride.”
Things won’t get much better for travelers there this week. Fifty flights have been canceled, and 50 more may be canceled tomorrow, according to the Telegraph.
The BBC spells out what went wrong.
Related on World Hum:
* Luggage We Have Loved
Photo by Michael Yessis
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Michael Yessis is the cofounder and coeditor-in-chief of World Hum.
Rory Boland 04.01.08 | 5:49 PM ET
Christ, called in Fedex, that’s the first I’ve heard of that. As a UK blog, we’ve been digging into the Heathrow debacle pretty deeply over on Lost Weekend.
What really baffles me is, who in god’s name is running the PR over at BA. Releasing statements claiming teething troubles and praising the fantastic design of terminal 5 in the first 48hrs only added fuel to the fire and rightly enraged passengers
It’s gone from hilarious farce, to national disgrace for us Brits.
Rory,
Lost Weekend
James Clark 04.02.08 | 9:11 AM ET
Sounds like the Denver International Airport, Concourse B baggage debacle all over again.
Is history bound to keep repeating itself?
Denver, DIA and United got such a terrible black eye from the supposed new high tech baggage system not working that it overshadowed everything else about the opening of the airport.