After defying Heathrow’s management’s directive asking airlines to cancel flights this summer to and from the London airport, the President of Emirates Airline and the CEO of Heathrow Airport held a constructive meeting.
Emirates agreed the airline was ready and willing to work with the airport to remediate the situation over the next 2 weeks, to keep demand and capacity in balance and provide passengers with a smooth and reliable journey through Heathrow this summer. Heathrow is trying to ease congestion at the airport.
Emirates has capped further sales on its flights out of Heathrow until mid-August to assist Heathrow in its resource ramp up, and is working to adjust capacity.
In the meantime, Emirates flights from Heathrow operate as scheduled and ticketed passengers may travel as booked.
Emirates had previously said, “At London Heathrow airport (LHR), our ground handling and catering – run by dnata, part of the Emirates Group – are fully ready and capable of handling our flights. So the crux of the issue lies with the central services and systems which are the responsibility of the airport operator.”
“Emirates is a key and steadfast operator at LHR, having reinstated six daily A380 flights since October 2021. From our past 10 months of regularly high seat loads, our operational requirements cannot be a surprise to the airport.”
Heathrow issued orders that they would limit departing passengers to 100,000 a day this summer. This move comes in the wake of limiting queues, baggage cancellations and delays, and the airport has urged airlines to stop selling tickets for flights that could be curtailed.
As per the reports, Britain’s busiest airport is struggling to manage the demand rebound after the pandemic. Further, airlines at Heathrow have also responded to a government appeal to cut capacity, whereas the airport added that it needed them to go further.
