A quiet news day. I recall this story appearing twice in the last year - if not more. My guess is that the problem stems from the deliberately confused way that slots are dealt with in the post privatisation of the UK airline world.
Amusingly, this paragraph is from near the end of
The Times article:
BMI, which operates 1,700 flights per week over a network of 36 airports, later confirmed that it would not be operating “empty” flights in order to protect Heathrow slots.
So - does that mean that the headline is just there to grab attention and that it's all hot air? Surely not.