There would be some cynics among the EK pilot group who would say this is a clear indication of how important our leaders believe the pilot to be in the grand scheme of things. Everyone else was considered important enough to be informed... but no one even considered the pilot played a large enough role to be needed to be told of the change of plan.
There must have been at least three 'error traps' in the last hour before landing, (for instance, the crew's inbound call to the company reps requesting a bay), any one of which should have alerted those on the ground (and in home base) that the aircraft was still heading for Heathrow. It would make for an interesting CRM exercise in tracing the circumstances of how they came to be missed.
If the captain (or the purser) involved is a Ppruner, I'd just love him to share with us all what he said in that first PA to the pax.The subsequent PAs must have been almost unique as well. Could the shouts of the passengers be heard from the cockpit?
That would be one day I suspect the pilots would be thankful for the locked cockpit door policy!!!! (And I'll bet the cabin crew would have all been wishing they could all be in there with the pilots!!)