LHR T5 ... long-haul
 

BA is to postpone moving most of its long-haul flights to T5 because of the teething problems it has had there.
they were supposed to have transferred over from April 30.
GMB welcome the move.


your thoughts?

Ian Shoesmith
BBC News

An inevitable move. Switching on 30th April would have made the events of 27th March look like a model of efficiency.

I'm sure that Air France and SkyTeam are doing their nut over this!

Everyone has been blaming BA, and they must take a great deal of the blame themselves, but BAA / Ferrovial is the main culprit as they run the airport, facilities and buildings. I'm sure that they don't mind the problems at T5 too much as they will be making more money out of retail. T5 is Bluewater 2!

Lets face it... UK aviation is quickly going down the pan like Britain's railways have!


EagleStar

Bravo. BA management finally sees some sense. Colleagues at BA pointed out to me last weekend that if BA management were to go ahead with the move from T4, T5's opening fiasco would look like a walk in the park.

And understandably, those who were to move to T4 after BA vacating, will hopefully demand damages from BAA (not BA). As long as this does not affect T1/2/3 too much, pax should hopefully grin and bear it a little while longer (or avoid LHR altogether). My future flights are mostly out of LGW - in a way that's a blessing in disguise.

S.

I travelled through T5 this week and despite the adverse publicity and lack of long haul passengers,the terminal was busy.still a building site,builders pass office in full view,unfinished work everywhere,covered signage,the list just go's on and on.plenty of very upmarket retail space which i am sure would be far better utilised in future for passenger comfort,but little chance of that!if and when BA switch the longhaul operation to T5 the lack of space will become very apparent.one last comment,when boarding my flight,after biometric reconciliation and boarding pass scanned,proceeded down escalator to airbridge,escalator suddenly stopped and automatic doors to airbridge closed,nearly causing passengers to fall forwards.the BA gate agent had to come down escalator,swipe open automatic doors then hold them open manually whilst we proceeded to board.obviously problems with equipment that is currently being used.

Exactly. And not just other airlines but their customers, too.

I pay extortionate Passenger Service Charges to use LHR and I don't see why the reshuffle to improve facilities for MY airline of choice should be delayed because of problems at BA.

I wonder if Harrods and the other low-variety high-price shops in T5 get to claim damages or at least a rent reduction from BAA as well, for making them wait an extra two months before the long-haul passengers show up to buy stuff.

Flew into T5 last Sunday. Well, at least tried to, got diverted to Birmingham due weather, different story...... anyway, after a couple of hours on the ground there, finally got to LHR/T5 - and sat about 50 m from the stand. After about 10 mins captain comes on and declares 'this is chaos - there's nobody to switch on the guidance system and nobody to operate the skybridge'. After another 10 mins or so we finally made it to the terminal.....

Once in there, the signage is a joke (to put it charitably), nobody had any idea where to go to. At the platform of the shuttle to the main terminal there was no sign indicating which train to use. It may be clear if you KNOW that this only runs between midfield and main terminals, but how many people do? Lots of people in hi-viz vests (what would the UK be without them :ugh:) milling about, quite obviously clueless as to what to do where. In any case, nobody, and I mean nobody, on the ground gave the impression to care a rat's a** what was going on. Anticipating chaos, I only travelled with carry-on luggage, so got out of this shambles rather quickly.

While I'm not sure who technically operates what in there, BA or BAA, as BA are the sole user of this terminal it is incumbent on them to ensure smooth operations. They have failed miserably.

To sum up - T5, best avoid.

For once a sensible decision is made in light of all the other previous cock ups!

BMI are pretty fed up to put it mildly -- they've just said they weren't told about BA's decision!

Juste wondering - what will happen with the slots BA was supposed to make free when moving long haul into T5 ?

so no chance of heathrow east opening for the olympics

W/W on Sky News has just admitted 25% of the original lost bags are still not reunited with their owners. But one question the news reader failed to ask him was, What percentage of new bags are being lost on the existing flights? Perhaps someone can ask that question from within the media, or from within the T5 handling system.

SO - very clearly BAA handed over a terminal which was not at all fit for use.

I recollect when the B744 was delivered, Boeing offered free full tanks to customers who were happy to take the aircraft as it stood.
BA declined and carried out pre-acceptance flight checks, returning the aircraft to the manufacturer to correct any minor faults detected.

Well, the acceptance check on T5 has been carried out and I trust that BA will not move further flights there until BAA can present a fully functioning facility.

British Airways postpones planned move to Heathrow Terminal 5
 

Good news everyone, my first post. hope this is news.

The farce continues...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.../11/nba111.xml

Its BA trying to use their size to push others around. bmi are picking up the mess that BA has made and over the last few weeks passengers are enjoying using T1 now BA have left. And the number of passengers saying they will use bmi again is growing every day. Some have said they will never go back to BA.
I can understand why bmi is upset. They are picking the mess and helping passengers and getting put down with the other hand.
I think a BA bmi merger will be off the cards.
BA got themeselves into this mess and BAA helped them. They should not cause more problems at Heathrow for other airlines just because they did give staff more training and time in T5 before it opened.
BA and BAA world wide laughing stoke.

Who's picking up the pieces?
 

Errrr, last time I checked, LHR was a BAA Airport, T5 was a BAA facility with baggage, signage etc all provided by BAA (although I do know there was a joint BA/BAA deal for the IT networks) .... so why do we keep seeing WW on TV apologising and not the head of the BAA?

BA is the customer, BAA is the provider, WW should be throwing down the gauntlet to get BAA to up their game pronto! ...which no doubt he is doing behind the scenes, but its BA thats getting all the stick..

Can you imagine the fireworks at BAA if Michaeol O'Leary was the customer!?

BA for sure have screwed up their planning and post operation logistics, but thank goodness they have had the sense to defer the long haul transfer. But it's BAA management that should be taking more of the heat and to quote Mr O'Leary who has even issued a press release on the topic post T5, 'its time to break up the London airport monopoly' I agree we need to get some proper competition and service enhancements underway..

Excellent piece in The Times the other day pushing for big user price hikes at LHR as a means of reducing demand and getting the airport back to working within its capacity... worth a read, but unlikley to find favour at BA.

Either way LHR today is full to busrting and cannot cope with any irregular operation, whether snow, strikes, security scares or logistics failures, runway or taxiway outages etc etc...How many time s has BA cancelled significant slices of its short haul operation over the last year for one or more of these reasons ?? I reckon one day in twenty affected.

Best avoid if at all possible!

FF

Come on guys even in Spain we managed to fit all the Oneworld airlines in one terminal without that much trouble ! MAD T4

By the way jokes apart don't you think that CDG, MAD,FRA,AMS have one thing in common that LHR lucks , that is RWYs and floor space . LHR will be the biggest looser in the next few years, only the A380 to boost the pax figures.

This must be the most cobard way of dealing with problems, what you do is plan ahead , imagine if I started a new route between LHR and DXB on a A321 configured in full charter seating, and then once I notice that we won't we making it there with all the pax that bought a ticket I decide to only take those that pay more. Imagine this happens for over 10 years....

Plan ahead
 

Spot on Eagle 21!

Maplin wasn't it!? We are paying the price now for decisions taken years ago..

Take a look at the excellent new airports in Hong Kong, KL, Munich etc etc to see what a bit of planning can achieve. But we are where we are.. the question is how to deal with it!

FF