MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Severe delays and flights' cancelling in Heathrow

Stringent security searches which have led to long delays and cancellations at London's Heathrow are not sustainable, airport operator BAA has warned following complaints from airlines forced to cancel flights.

The airport cancelled a third of flights on Saturday evening in a bid to speed its return to a normal schedule. Heathrow earlier came under fire from British Airways for being unable to cope with the extra security measures.

Meanwhile, Ryanair said the government should provide additional staff to carry out body searches at airports. The British Airports Authority said Heathrow was suffering severe delays, meaning that a third of departing flights Saturday evening would be cancelled. However, the remaining flights should depart from Heathrow on schedule or as close to schedule as possible.

BAA said the decision was "extremely regrettable" but added that it was the only way services could return to normal.

Tony Douglas, BAA's chief executive officer for Heathrow, earlier spoke about how the extra searches were affecting the airport. "If this is maintained we are likely to continue to see extremely long queues and regrettably even more flights cancelled."

"Quite simply I don't know how long it's likely to go on, but it's clearly a set of measures that are unprecedented and by virtue of what they've come in to enforce, they're not sustainable measures."

But Willie Walsh, British Airways chief executive, criticised Heathrow and insisted his company was ready to fly a full schedule, "the airport's baggage system cannot process all of the passengers' bags and, where passengers have been able to check their bags in, the lengthy queues in the airport security search area means that passengers are unable to get to the departure gate in time for their flight."

He added that BA had to cancel 25% of its short-haul services on Saturday while "many" other flights left without all passengers. "We are ready and able to operate a full schedule at London Heathrow. We have sufficient flying crew, ground staff and aircraft in place".

"However BAA is unable to provide a robust security search process and baggage operation at London Heathrow and as a result we are being forced to cancel flights and operate some others from Heathrow without all the passengers onboard".

However all BA services had now resumed at Manchester and Birmingham airports subject to delay. Ryanair's chief executive officer Michael O'Leary said BAA needed help from the government.

"If the British government is serious about defeating terrorism and not allowing the terrorists to disrupt normal everyday British life, then the government must provide the additional security staffing - either police or army reserve personnel - immediately to prevent London's main airports from grinding to a halt over the coming days."

A spokesman for the British Department for Transport said: "We understand the situation remains difficult.

Government is providing assistance on many levels and we are working intensively with the airlines and airport authorities. In particular we are discussing with BAA, the operators of Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, on how the Government can continue to work with them in dealing with the situation."

A British Airways spokesperson said "we would not anticipate it being any better tomorrow unless something changes in the way BAA operates at Heathrow or does something to reduce the tremendous congestion at the airport."