London Heathrow Airport cancellations: airport sees dozens of flights cancelled including British Airways

Dozens of flights have been cancelled at Heathrow Airport due to freezing fog. British Airways, the largest carrier at the airport, has axed around 80 flights with conditions deemed not safe to fly.

This comes as temperatures in the UK have plummeted in recent weeks. Temperatures dropped to as low as -8.4°C  at Heathrow on Monday morning (January 23).

According to reports, airlines were informed on Sunday night (January 22) that they would have to reduce the number of flights by approximately 15 percent due to the weather and Air Traffic Control restrictions.

On the London Heathrow website, it shows  departing flights to the likes of Manchester, Oslo, Prague, Aberdeen and more have all been cancelled. Flights arriving from locations including Warsaw, New York and Bucharest have also been cancelled.

Speaking to the BBC, a spokesman for Heathrow said, poor visibility was forecast for Monday morning at the airport and across the south-east of England. "While there may be minor changes to [Monday’s] schedule as a result of the weather, we want to reassure passengers that our colleagues are working in close collaboration with our airline and air traffic control partners to get them safely away on their journeys as quickly as possible.”

What is freezing fog?

According to the Met Office, “Freezing fog forms in the same way as normal fog when the land cools overnight under clear skies. If there are clear skies, the heat radiates back into space leading to cooling at the earth’s surface.

“This results in a reduction of the air’s ability to hold moisture which allows water vapour to condense into tiny water droplets eventually leading to the formation of fog. They become supercooled water droplets of remaining liquid even though they are below freezing temperature.”