More airport chaos! Electrical fire shuts JFK terminal and forces international flights from Europe, China and New Zealand to re-route – including one Air New Zealand plane to turn back SEVEN HOURS into journey
- Terminal 1 remains closed today after an electrical panel failure sparked a fire
- It caused a power outage that sent dozens of flights into chaos
- One Air New Zealand flight was forced to turn around after seven hours
JFK airport is still in chaos today after an electrical fire caused a power outage yesterday, scuppering flights from Europe and New Zealand.
Terminal 1 – which services airlines including Air China, Air France, Alitalia, Lufthansa, Royal Air Maroc and Saudi Arabian Airlines – remains closed today as a result of the fire.
A port authority spokesman says the fire was the result of an ‘electrical panel failure’.
As a result, more chaos is expected today as flights are redirected to different airports and cities.
One Air New Zealand flight from Auckland was forced to turn around after seven hours in the air yesterday. By the time it landed back where it started, passengers were onboard for 16 hours.
As of 8am on Friday, four JFK flights had been canceled and 32 were delayed.
Terminal 1 flights canceled on Friday morning after a power outage sparked by an electrical fire. Others were moved to different terminals or airports
An Air New Zealand flight was forced to turn back after seven hours in the air. By the time it landed back in Auckland, it had been in the air for 16 hours
The airport failure is the latest in a long list of travel headaches in the US in the last six months.
Flight NZ2 left Auckland on Thursday night, before turning around seven hours later and landing back again at 1pm local time on Friday afternoon.
The airline decided to turn back to New Zealand rather than land at a different US airport because doing so ‘would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers.’
New Zealand air added: ‘We apologize for the inconvenience and thank our customers for their patience and understanding.’
Some 130 flights are believed to have been cancelled since Thursday, according to Flightaware.com
‘Travelers should check with their carriers for flight status before coming to the airport,’ JFK said.
Port Authority is continuing to work with the terminal’s operator to restore flight operations as quickly as possible, it added.