A major power cut at Manchester Airport over the weekend has had a knock-on effect with thousands of passengers still affected on Monday.
The power outage hit electronic systems and computers in the airport in the early hours of Sunday, meaning 70 departing flights and 50 arrivals were terminated, according to aviation analytics company Cirium.
There were no flights at all from two of Manchester Airport’s three terminals for several hours, which led to huge queues and frayed tempers.
Travel journalist Simon Calder wrote on social media platform X, “Manchester airport: 20,000 passengers woke up in the wrong place this morning after 140 flights were cancelled on Sunday.”
“Stranded travellers should be flown to their destinations as soon as possible, ideally with their baggage,” he added.
Several flights left for their destinations with the passengers on board but not their luggage, which was unable to be checked in as a result of the power failure.
One airline, Jet2.com, said it “may take some time” for all baggage to catch up with its owners.
Flights are operating normally on Monday with only a handful of cancellations.
Manchester Airport said in a statement it “would like to apologise to all those affected” by Sunday’s power cuts.
‘Power Spike’
Managing Director Chris Woodroofe, speaking in a video statement on Facebook on Sunday, said, “There was a big power spike in our electrical systems due to a failure earlier on this morning and that’s damaged some really key equipment for our departure security and departure baggage systems.”“So that has meant that Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 haven’t been able to depart aircraft today and as a result we haven’t been able to land those aircraft because there’s no space to park those aircraft on the airfield,” he added.
In a message to passengers, Jet2.com said: “Some flights departed with reduced or no luggage as we were unable to load bags on to our aircraft, as the baggage system at the airport was inoperable during the outage.
“Please be advised that our UK-based ground operations team will work hard to ensure that we get your baggage to you, as soon as we can, as you can appreciate this may take some time and we will endeavour to be in contact with you by the end of the day on Monday,” the statement added.
“We understand how frustrating this situation must be and although the situation was beyond our control we will do everything we can to get all luggage to its final destination as soon as we possibly can,” Jet2.com added.
Flights Diverted to London and Birmingham Airports
A flight arriving from Houston in the United States had to go to London Heathrow while another from Singapore was forced to land at London Gatwick.An Etihad Airways flight from Abu Dhabi Zayed was diverted to Birmingham.
Later on Monday, Manchester Airport posted a statement on X which said, “All our systems are running as normal today, so passengers are advised to travel as usual from Manchester Airport.”
“The airport is due to be slightly busier than usual due to passengers affected by cancellations yesterday but we have extra staff in place and our resilience team is helping out.”
Manchester Airport, originally known as Ringway, was opened in the 1930s and has two runways and three terminals, the oldest of which was built in 1962 but significantly updated in 2009.
Terminal 2 is currently being refurbished with £1.3 billion of investment and is due to be completed next year.
Last year 54 million passengers used the airport, which is partly owned by Manchester City Council (35.5 percent), IFM Global Infrastructure Fund (35.5 percent), and the nine other councils in the Greater Manchester area.
