Liveblogging Heathrow, in spite of no real need for speed
So here I am spending a Sunday afternoon in London’s Heathrow Airport, as I have on far too many Sundays in my life. It turns out this visit will be quite a bit longer than normal, thanks to President Bush. He landed here a few hours ago, shutting down the airspace of one of the world’s busiest airports. They are now working through the delays, largely by cancelling numerous flights throughout Europe.
There have been pretty acid press descriptions of the President’s airborne baggage train: Air Force One, a full back-up 747, a 757, and four helicopters. And that’s in a very pro-American paper. There were significant delays on Thursday here as various armored cars were pre-positioned. Yesterday multiple helicopters did a series of practice exercises for today’s landings that apparently created multi-hour delays as well. I sure am glad we don’t act like an empire.
Place yourself in the position of a middle manager at Sainsbury’s getting a flight to Amsterdam, who is now spending an extra four to seven hours in the airport – if he’s lucky enough to get to Amsterdam at all tonight to make his meeting tomorrow morning. A harassed gate agent explains why this delay is happening. Multiply by about 100,000. You can imagine just how much goodwill has been created for the US here at this airport today.
I hope Sainsbury’s middle managers know that, if you’re going from London to Amsterdam, you fly out of London City or, if you’re not coming from the center of town, Stansted or Gatwick. Heathrow is a disaster even when his Imperial Magnificence isn’t coming to town, and for short hops to the continent there are plenty of better alternatives (and, increasingly, for crossing the Atlantic as well).
But your point stands, of course.
— Noah Millman · Jun 16, 02:41 AM · #
I wonder why His Magnificence cannot land at one of the many military airfields in the UK; either those leased and used by the US or those of the RAF? That would seem to minimize the impact on civil aviation and enhance “security”. After all, he isn’t going to take the tube into the City and there are plenty of helipads available.
But then, if he an his entourage were thinking like that, they would hardly be so magnificent.
— Central Texan · Jun 16, 03:01 AM · #