Passengers have been stuck in the chaotic scenes at Heathrow Airport on Friday, with multiple hour-long queues for security and huge crowds following the evacuation of Terminal 2 this morning. The reason for the evacuation is not yet known, but there have been unconfirmed reports of a suspcious package or abandoned luggage having been identifed.
The area was cleared as a precaution and a controlled re-entry to the Queen’s Terminal followed once the incident had been resolved.
A Heathrow spokesperson said earlier today: “This morning our teams worked with emergency services to respond to an incident in Terminal 2 which has now been resolved.
“We ask passengers to check with their airline if flying from Terminal 2, the rest of the airport is operating normally.”
While the airport has now reopened, the live departure information on the airport’s website shows that dozens of flights have been delayed, or even cancelled.
There are also now several hour-long queues for security, with passengers getting to their gates with barely any time to spare.
Laura Lindsay, who was stuck in the queue for over two hours, filmed the scenes.
Speaking exclusively to Express Online, she said: “We arrived at the terminal at 10.40, we were through security by 1pm. My sister made it to her gate with ten min to spare. It was chaos.”
At around midday, another traveller estimated the security queue to take about an hour and a half. He made it to his gate with 20 minutes to his flight’s depature, but now expects delays, he told Express Online.
Other confused and frustrated travellers took to X to document the disruption, with one person adding: “UK Labour have been in charge for 5 mins and the country has ground to a halt.”
Other images showed police with sniffer dogs roaming outside before the terminal was reopened. Passengers also reported a “crush” when the terminal reopened.
The chaos is likely to affect the thousands of England supporters set to travel to Germany in time for the Euro 2024 quarter final match on Saturday.
Mark Pusey, 44, told Mail Online that he was at the airport for his journey to Leipzig, Germany, but now fears he will miss his connecting flight to Frankfurt.
He described some of the terminals as “pandemonium” with people “running all over the place.”
“They shut the terminal and nobody will tell us why… There is just a complete lack of information. Nobody has said anything. Every time I asked staff a question they reply with ‘I can’t tell you’.”
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