As fire rips through multi-storey terminal car park at Luton Airport yesterday’s evening in London, flights have been suspended.
Flights were halted until 15:00 BST after the fire at the multi-storey caused the building to suffer a “significant structural collapse.”
BBC reports that no serious injuries have been reported but Four firefighters and a member of airport staff were treated for the effects of breathing in smoke.
Bedfordshire Fire and Rescue Service believes the blaze was accidental and started in a vehicle at about 20:45 BST.
It said one witness said he saw an explosion on the roof of the car park followed by a “flame that shot across the car park like a flame thrower.”After that, he saw cars exploding “every few minutes.”
The car park is believed to hold up to 1,900 vehicles and hundreds of cars may have been damaged.
The airport said its priority was the safety of passengers and staff and it hoped to “get the airport operational as soon as possible.”
Andy Hopkinson, Bedfordshire’s chief fire officer, said the service had “no intelligence than to suggest it was anything other than an accidental fire.”
He said it was thought the fire started in “diesel-powered” car and then spread through the building.
The car park did not appear to have sprinklers, according to Mr Hopkinson, and he said a recommendation for sprinklers in any redevelopment would be made to the airport.
The inform source quoted Hopkinson, as saying that the car park’s open sides would have allowed the fire to spread “horizontally” before it went up through the building.
As a ramp would be installed on the unaffected part of the car park to help remove unaffected vehicles, he said Firefighters were staying on site to monitor the “smouldering remains.”
Public transport running to the airport has been cancelled and some roads in the immediate vicinity, such as Vauxhall Way, have been closed.
After Bedfordshire Police asked people not to travel to the area, Hopkinson said: “There is a substantial number that are not damaged and our focus as well is can we remove those vehicles safely without causing any danger to the responders?”
Hundreds of people were stranded, with many saying their cars were in the car park.
The report said many were struggling with their luggage to Luton Airport’s railway station as they tried to catch a train, with others trying to get coaches to other airports in order to catch alternative flights.
All the airport hotels were fully booked and many passengers said it felt like airlines had simply dumped them.
London Luton is the UK’s fifth largest airport after Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester and Stansted, carrying more than 13 million passengers in 2022.
According to the report, the airport said in a statement on Tuesday night: “All flights are currently suspended as emergency services respond to a car fire that has spread in Terminal Car Park 2.
“Access to the airport is currently restricted and we ask that people do not travel to the airport at this time.”