Heathrow, CEO unattainable during the Marchout in March: « He slept and had the phone in silent mode »
This was revealed by the independent investigation report after the stop on 21 March with almost 1,300 canceled flights and 200 thousand passengers affected. From flames to closure here are all the phases
While London Heathrow airport – one of the most crowded and important in the world – It was closed shortly after midnight due to a blackoutthe managing director Thomas Woldbye did not respond to the different calls and did not hear any of the alarms received because he was sleeping and, he claims, that evening the mobile phone « had passed in silent mode, without him noticing ». The detail of the total absence of the head in the decision -making process that led to the complete detention for almost a day and the cancellation of about 1,300 flights is halfway through the independent ratio drawn up to shed light on what happened in the early hours of March 21 last.
The document
A 75 -page report that examines every aspect of the story and in which the panel comes to the conclusion that « the airport reacted well on the day of the accident and managed to completely restore the operations without hitches the next day ». « However – the speakers specify – the revision has identified a series of lessons learned and formulates different recommendations on how the airport should further strengthen its ability to respond to serious events like this ».
The criticisms of the Aviolinee
The conclusions, especially in the part relating to the CEO, will end up in the voluminous folder of complaints that the CEO of the airlines have for some time addressed to Woldbye, in particular as regards the increasingly high airport costs in the face of a service judged not always up to par. That’s why, according to what the Courierfor a few weeks there has been the attempt to block the vectors of vectors to push the Heathrow CEO to the expulsion of the CEO.
The flames
In the report – conducted by Ruth Kelly, member of the Heathrow Board of Directors and former transport minister – a sequence of events of that day is also provided. From 11.40 pm on March 20 – the 00.40 of March 21 in Italy – when the employees of the airport note the flames to be released from to an power plant through the screens of the security cameras. Between 23.55 and 00.21 many systems go out because they lose the current. The « Command & Control » is immediately activated, the crisis unit.
The two alarms
Just at 00.21 the first alarm is launched on the devices of first level people, including the Woldbye CEO. A further alert is repeated an hour and a half later. In all this to 1.08 the Operational Director of Heathrow, Javier Echave, arrives in the airport. It is he – moreover authorized – who decides during the meeting at 1.15 to close the airport. A « notm » (aeronavigability bulletin) is sent to 1.44 to the vectors by notifying the block to Heathrow.
The operational stop
Several planes, flying towards the London airport, go back or divert elsewhere. At 1.52 the « Golden Command » is activated, the highest level of alert. And in all this does Heathrow’s CEO does? He sleeps and does not notice anything. « Operational director Echave has also tried to call Mr. Woldbye several times in the early hours of March 21, » reads the report.
« Without his knowledge »
« Although his phone was on the bedside table – he is put black on white – Mr. Woldbye reported that he had not been notified of the alarms or the calls of Mr. Echave because the phone had entered silently, without his knowledge, while he was sleeping. The registers confirm that the phone was not off and that emergency calls did not receive answers. Mr. Woldbye became aware of the accident around 06.45 on March 21 ».
Reopening
The various terminals were gradually reopened between the late afternoon of 21 and the dawn of 22 May. Only on 21, 1,273 flights were deleted – between departures and arrivals -, hitting something like 200 thousand passengers. Another 107 flights (for almost 17 thousand travelers) were canceled the next day, calculate the document. The CEO Woldbye « expressed its deep regret for not having been contactable during the night of the accident », write the speakers of the relationship.
The recommendations
Among the suggestions there is one on the management of notices at the top. « The revision committee recommends that Heathrow evaluates possible improvements in the notification process in the event of a critical accident (in addition to the telephone alarm system), including the possibility of notifying key people through a second contact channel for significant events ». For example, he ironically, sending a person to intercom at the CEO house.
