Flights are expected to “run as usual” on Monday after heavy disruption hit passengers over the weekend due to a major power cut, Manchester Airport said. The outage, which hit systems in the early hours of Sunday, meant that by lunchtime, 66 outbound flights (25% of all departures) and 50 inbound journeys (18% of all arrivals) were axed, according to aviation analytics company Cirium.
The airport had said no flights were departing from terminals one and two, leading to huge queues and disruption to baggage processing throughout the day. In an update posted to social media on Sunday night, Manchester Airport said it is not anticipating any “further disruption” for Monday.
A statement said: “We would like to apologise to all those affected by the disruption in Terminals 1 and 2 today. Tomorrow’s schedule is expected to run as usual with no further disruption so passengers should plan to travel to the airport as normal, checking in two hours ahead of their flight for short-haul, and three hours for long-haul.
“It is always advisable to check the status of your flight before you travel to the airport.”
The statement continued: “Airlines will be in touch with passengers to rearrange cancelled flights as we work with airlines, their baggage handling agents and other partners to make sure passengers whose bags did not make it onto their flights are reunited with their belongings as soon as possible. We thank passengers for their patience today and we would also like to thank all of our staff, airlines and onsite partners for their hard work and resilience.”
Earlier on Sunday, managing director Chris Woodroofe told BBC News a “fault with a cable had caused a power surge that took down security systems and baggage screening”.
Mr Woodroofe said: “When Terminal 1 and 2 can’t depart passengers for an entire morning there is going to be an impact. And I’m really sorry that happened and we’re now making sure as we look forward, that impact doesn’t carry on into tomorrow.”
He said an investigation into what happened is set to take place. The disruption also meant a number of arriving flights were diverted to other airports.
One Singapore Airlines flight arriving from Houston in Texas had to go to London Heathrow while another, which came in from Singapore, was forced to land at London Gatwick. An Etihad Airways flight from Abu Dhabi Zayed International Airport was diverted to Birmingham Airport.
Among those caught up in the disruption was Samuel Martin, 27, a student at the University of Sheffield, and his friend Matthew O’Brien, 27, an operations manager, whose flight to Manchester Airport from New Zealand via Singapore was diverted to Heathrow.
Mr Martin, of Chesterfield, Derbyshire, said: “We had someone driving to come and pick us up from Manchester Airport who had to turn around and go home.”
At just after 3pm, the airport said it was in the process of resuming operations.