Portal:England/Selected article/11 2007

London Heathrow Airport is an International Airport, located in London. Heathrow is one of the busiest airports in the world, with an estimated 67,527,923 passengers travelling through each year. The other international airport in London is London City Airport, however is used less frequently now than Heathrow. The airport consists of two main runways, each running parallel to each other, there is also four terminals, with a fifth one under construction, it is expected to be opened in March 2008.

Heathrow Airport started in the 1930s, at this time, it was owned by Fairey Aviation, a private aviation company which was in operation for the first half of the 20th Century. At this time, the airport was used only for testing of aircraft and assembly. The name of the airport is originally from Hamlet, Heath Row, which was demolished in order to make way for the area where terminal 3 now stands. However, at this point, it was still not used as a commercial airport, and other airports throughout London served as the main passenger transport locations.

At the time of the second half of the 20th century, the airport had now been used commercially for several years. It was due to this, that the London Underground took the direct decision to extend their routes to serve Heathrow, this meant that transport from the centre of England could be made in just under one hour, via the Piccadilly Line. Further changes were made in 1998 to the rail transport connecting the airport to London, the Heathrow Express train was introduced — providing a link to Paddington Station from the airport.

Over time, Heathrow has become the subject of several security and terrorist risks. The latest recorded was the 2006 transatlantic aircraft plot, which occurred on 10 August 2006, when a planned terrorist attack on aeroplanes flying from the United Kingdom to the United States of America was discovered. The earliest recorded security incident was on 19 May 1974 when the IRA planted several bombs in the terminal one car park, injuring two people.

Today, Heathrow still remains one of the busiest airports in the world, and Europe's busiest airport for passenger traffic.