Heathrow Airport has issued an apology after a technical glitch caused caused a mass of suitcases at a terminal on Friday.
Deborah Haynes, defence and security editor for Sky News, witnessed the “enormous luggage carpet” after arriving at the west London airport from Brussels on Friday evening.
Suddenly a slight wait for my luggage to arrive at @HeathrowAirport is even more of an irrelevance - at least it came on the same flight and is leaving with me… pic.twitter.com/h42BfCe0mo
— Deborah Haynes (@haynesdeborah) June 17, 2022
She said: "The warning signs that all was not well were clear at baggage claim. There were clusters of suitcases without owners grouped around various conveyor belts.
"I wondered where the owners were."
Haynes, who had been asked to put her hand luggage in the plane’s hold before the flight, said she only had to wait “a little” while for it after the flight.
She added: "Then when I stepped outside I could see this crazy mass of suitcases filling the pavement like an enormous luggage carpet. I’ve never seen anything like it.
"Though it did seem to be trying to be organised chaos.
"Officials looked to be trying to arrange the suitcases next to poles with letters from the alphabet stuck on them - maybe it was to correspond with the name of the owner of each bag. It looked to be an epic task."
A spokesperson for Heathrow Airport said: “Earlier today there was a technical issue with the Terminal 2 baggage system which has now been resolved.
"Passengers are now able to check-in as normal, but a number of passengers who departed from Terminal 2 earlier today may have travelled without their luggage.
"We are working closely with airlines to reunite passengers with their luggage as soon as possible.
"We’re sorry there has been disruption to passenger journeys."
The airport will limit the number of daily flights to 825 in July and 850 in August. Ordinarily, up to 900 flights would take off and land at the airport during these months.
The restrictions followed a joint letter from the Civil Aviation Authority and Department for Transport ordering airlines to rip up their timetables this summer and only schedule flights that carriers were confident would go ahead.
