Flights start departing from two Manchester Airport terminals after travel chaos
Flights have started departing from Manchester Airport’s two main terminals after a “major power cut” caused travel chaos for passengers.
The airport said in a post on X that it was “now in the process of resuming operations” and it expects “flights to restart during the remainder of this afternoon and evening”.
It added: “It remains important that passengers check with their airlines before travelling to the airport.
“We are also working closely with airlines to reschedule cancelled flights in the coming days. Flights scheduled for tomorrow should be unaffected and passengers due to travel should plan to come to the airport as usual.”
Passengers in the airport are facing significant delays. Pic: Reuters
Pic: Reuters
Earlier, the facility had said all flights from Terminals 1 and 2 were cancelled “until further notice” and passengers were advised not to come to the site.
Travellers due to fly from Terminal 3 were largely unaffected.
It was understood the power outage in the early hours of Sunday hit the airport only, after it was initially thought to have affected a wider surrounding area.
Passengers already inside the airport have faced huge delays, with images showing huge queues of people.
There have been instances where some people’s baggage was not on flights.
Chris Woodroofe, Manchester Airport’s managing director, apologised for the chaos, stating: “About 20% of our flights have been cancelled so far, and about 40% have operated. There’s still 40% to go.
“I think it’s inevitable that some of those flights won’t take off which is why it’s so important that passengers talk to their airlines about their flights.”
He added: “Tomorrow we are very much hoping to run an entirely scheduled operation.”
Pic: Reuters
Pic: X/SebbieJ
Holidaymaker Lindsay Mitchell was hopeful she and her family would be able to fly to Turkey later today for a trip that had been planned for a year.
She was due to go with her husband, daughter, son, her son’s girlfriend, her daughter’s boyfriend, her nieces, her sister, and her two granddaughters.
Ms Mitchell told Sky News: “We were advised this morning not to travel to Manchester Airport but we’d thought we’d chance it as our flight’s not until 6.30pm teatime, fingers crossed.”
She added: “You have got to make the best of a bad situation. It’s not the airline’s fault, it’s not Manchester Airport’s fault, it’s no one’s fault, it’s just one of those freaky things that happen in everyday life.”
Holidaymaker Lindsay Mitchell is hopeful she and her family will fly to Turkey later today
Another passenger, Hayden Lewis, said his flight to the Greek island of Skiathos was cancelled after he was in the airport for about five hours.
He later went to Birmingham Airport after being dropped off by his father and is hopeful of getting to his holiday destination.
Mr Lewis told Sky News: “Our flight got cancelled after being in the airport for about five hours. Left with no idea when they [the airline] could get us there, so we have taken it into our own hands and are now in Birmingham Airport going to the right destination.
“We were going to Skiathos for nine nights. We travelled from Halifax to Manchester. We are now in Birmingham thanks to my dad who collected us from Manchester and dropped us in Birmingham. All because easyJet don’t know when they could get us back out but want us to keep checking the app (along with the thousands of others).”
EasyJet, which operates flights from Terminal 1 at Manchester Airport, said there were “very long queues” for security and disruption to hold baggage processing, meaning passengers could board flights only with cabin luggage.
It said: “Although outside of our control, we would like to apologise for any inconvenience experienced as a result.
“We are doing all we can and working closely with the airport team to minimise the disruption.”
Pics: Reuters
Meanwhile, a number of arriving flights were earlier being diverted to other airports so anyone due to pick passengers up from Manchester Airport should check before they travel.
An Etihad Airways flight from Abu Dhabi Zayed International Airport was diverted to Birmingham Airport.
The airport said: “We apologise for any inconvenience and aim to restore normal service as soon as possible.”
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A Virgin Atlantic spokesperson said: “Following a site-wide power outage at Manchester Airport, baggage systems are currently not operational.
“Our teams are working closely with the airport authorities and are keeping our customers up to date with the latest information.
“Virgin Atlantic flights are currently departing but may be subject to minor delays.”
The UK-US trade deal has been signed and is “done”, US President Donald Trump has said as he met Sir Keir Starmer at the G7 summit.
The US president told reporters in Canada: “We signed it, and it’s done. It’s a fair deal for both. It’ll produce a lot of jobs, a lot of income.”
Sir Keir said the document “implements” the deal to cut tariffs on cars and aerospace, describing it as a “really important agreement”.
“So this is a very good day for both of our countries – a real sign of strength,” the prime minister added.
Mr Trump added that the UK was “very well protected” against any future tariffs, saying: “You know why? Because I like them”.
However, he did not say whether levies on British steel exports to the US would be set to 0%, saying “we’re gonna let you have that information in a little while”.
Mr Trump also praised Sir Keir as a “great” prime minister, adding: “We’ve been talking about this deal for six years, and he’s done what they haven’t been able to do.”
He added: “We’re very longtime partners and allies and friends and we’ve become friends in a short period of time.
“He’s slightly more liberal than me to put it mildly… but we get along.”
Sir Keir added that “we make it work”.
As the pair exited a mountain lodge in the Canadian Rockies where the summit is being held, Mr Trump held up a physical copy of the trade agreement to show reporters.
Several leaves of paper fell from the binding, and Sir Keir quickly stooped to pick them up, saying: “A very important document.”
Sir Keir Starmer picks up paper from the UK-US trade deal after Donald Trump dropped it at the G7 summit. Pic: Reuters
The US president also appeared to mistakenly refer to a “trade agreement with the European Union” at one point as he stood alongside the British prime minister.
Mr Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs on countries in April. At the time, he announced 10% “reciprocal” rates on all UK exports – as well as separately announced 25% levies on cars and steel.
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In a joint televised phone call in May, Sir Keir and Mr Trump announced the UK and US had agreed on a trade deal – but added the details were being finalised.
Ahead of the G7 summit, the prime minister said he would meet Mr Trump for “one-on-one” talks, and added the agreement “really matters for the vital sectors that are safeguarded under our deal, and we’ve got to implement that”.
Whitehall officials tried to convince Michael Gove to go to court to cover up the grooming scandal in 2011, Sky News can reveal.
Dominic Cummings, who was working for Lord Gove at the time, has told Sky News that officials in the Department for Education (DfE) wanted to help efforts by Rotherham Council to stop a national newspaper from exposing the scandal.
In an interview with Sky News, Mr Cummings said that officials wanted a “total cover-up”.
Politics latest: Grooming gangs findings unveiled
The revelation shines a light on the institutional reluctance of some key officials in central government to publicly highlight the grooming gang scandal.
In 2011, Rotherham Council approached the Department for Education asking for help following inquiries by The Times. The paper’s then chief reporter, the late Andrew Norfolk, was asking about sexual abuse and trafficking of children in Rotherham.
The council went to Lord Gove’s Department for Education for help. Officials considered the request and then recommended to Lord Gove’s office that the minister back a judicial review which might, if successful, stop The Times publishing the story.
Lord Gove rejected the request on the advice of Mr Cummings. Sources have independently confirmed Mr Cummings’ account.
Education Secretary Michael Gove in 2011. Pic: PA
Mr Cummings told Sky News: “Officials came to me in the Department of Education and said: ‘There’s this Times journalist who wants to write the story about these gangs. The local authority wants to judicially review it and stop The Times publishing the story’.
“So I went to Michael Gove and said: ‘This council is trying to actually stop this and they’re going to use judicial review. You should tell the council that far from siding with the council to stop The Times you will write to the judge and hand over a whole bunch of documents and actually blow up the council’s JR (judicial review).’
“Some officials wanted a total cover-up and were on the side of the council…
“They wanted to help the local council do the cover-up and stop The Times’ reporting, but other officials, including in the DfE private office, said this is completely outrageous and we should blow it up. Gove did, the judicial review got blown up, Norfolk stories ran.”
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Grooming gangs victim speaks out
The judicial review wanted by officials would have asked a judge to decide about the lawfulness of The Times’ publication plans and the consequences that would flow from this information entering the public domain.
A second source told Sky News that the advice from officials was to side with Rotherham Council and its attempts to stop publication of details it did not want in the public domain.
One of the motivations cited for stopping publication would be to prevent the identities of abused children entering the public domain.
There was also a fear that publication could set back the existing attempts to halt the scandal, although incidents of abuse continued for many years after these cases.
Sources suggested that there is also a natural risk aversion amongst officials to publicity of this sort.
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Mr Cummings, who ran the Vote Leave Brexit campaign and was Boris Johnson’s right-hand man in Downing Street, has long pushed for a national inquiry into grooming gangs to expose failures at the heart of government.
He said the inquiry, announced today, “will be a total s**tshow for Whitehall because it will reveal how much Whitehall worked to try and cover up the whole thing.”
He also described Mr Johnson, with whom he has a long-standing animus, as a “moron’ for saying that money spent on inquiries into historic child sexual abuse had been “spaffed up the wall”.
Asked by Sky News political correspondent Liz Bates why he had not pushed for a public inquiry himself when he worked in Number 10 in 2019-20, Mr Cummings said Brexit and then COVID had taken precedence.
“There are a million things that I wanted to do but in 2019 we were dealing with the constitutional crisis,” he said.
The Department for Education and Rotherham Council have been approached for comment.
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