Chaos at Heathrow Terminal 5 as furious passengers almost come to blows with BA staff after being forced to wait more than an hour and a half for luggage ‘because of shortage of baggage handlers’
- Passengers arriving into Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 5 were stuck on Saturday
- One member of British Airways staff reportedly ‘almost assaulted’ by passenger
Furious passengers faced chaotic scenes and and confronted British Airways staff at Heathrow Airport after having to wait more than an hour and a half for their luggage.
Passengers arriving into Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 5 were stuck waiting alongside empty baggage carousels shortly after disembarking their flights on Saturday afternoon.
One member of British Airways staff was reportedly ‘almost assaulted’ amid a mutiny at the airline’s complaint desk.
Passengers attributed the delays to a shortage of baggage handlers, with many fearing such delays will become a regular fixture if the issues are not addressed prior to the half term and summer holidays.
One told MailOnline: ‘Terminal Five clearly has not fixed the staffing issue with baggage handlers.
One member of British Airways staff was reportedly ‘almost assaulted’ amid a mutiny at the airline’s complaint desk
Passengers attributed the delays to a shortage of baggage handlers, with many fearing such delays will become a regular fixture
‘On Saturday afternoon passengers were waiting an hour and a half for their bags to arrive on the carousel. The excuse given was that there was not enough to staff to cover the afternoon/evening shift.
‘There was a near mutiny at the complaints desk. One BA staff member was almost assaulted by an angry passenger who claimed this happened to him every week, and another was warned for berating staff.
‘The desk staff ended up claiming they had called the police. If it is chaos now, it does not bode well for half-term holidays or even summer.’
Others took to Twitter to describe the ‘massive delays’.
One said: ‘Absolute chaos at Heathrow. Waited 2hours for our luggage. No staff to unload bags. Welcome back to the UK.’
A second added: ‘Chaos at Heathrow T5. Massive delays in baggage arrivals. Very little information from the airport authorities.’
A spokesperson for Heathrow said the airport was operating as normal on Saturday and baggage handling is handled by individual airlines.
British Airways said it was not aware of any major incidents.
