Storms delay more than 600 flights at Heathrow and Gatwick

Thunderstorms cut through the air corridors over Heathrow and Gatwick on Saturday, delaying more than 600 flights and pushing some departures back by up to six hours as a hot spell gave way to rain, lightning and gusty winds. Dozens more flights were cancelled as the two hubs absorbed the worst of the disruption.

FlightAware data showed 340 delayed flights at Heathrow and 320 at Gatwick. Eurocontrol data showed those were the only two UK airports facing heavy delays tied to the storm system.

Gatwick put temporary air-traffic control restrictions in place because of thunderstorms, while NATS expected weather disruption to continue through the rest of the day after severe conditions forecast across south-east England. The bottleneck sat not just on the runways but in the airspace feeding them, where storms over the routes between south-east England and north-western Europe slowed movements and forced airlines to reshuffle schedules.

EasyJet pre-emptively cancelled some flights to and from Gatwick and was notifying passengers about rebooking, refunds, hotel accommodation and meals where required. Gatwick’s live departure board showed delays stretching into the evening, including an EasyJet flight to Antalya that moved from an 11:50 BST departure to 18:00. One person wrote online that a daughter had spent four hours on an EasyJet plane at Gatwick before the flight was cancelled.

Severe delays or cancellations can trigger compensation or refunds under Heathrow’s passenger guidance, with claims governed by airline rules and Civil Aviation Authority requirements. The Met Office forecast for London and South East England on Saturday 27 June called for early showery rain and thunderstorms to clear eastwards before conditions became less hot than Friday, after an earlier thunderstorm warning for the region flagged frequent lightning, gusty winds, torrential rain and some hail.