Tuesday April 15, 02:04 PM
British Airways executives depart after Heathrow debacle
LONDON (AFP) - Two senior executives are leaving British Airways (LSE: BAY.L - news) , the company said Tuesday, following the chaotic opening of its new Terminal 5 building at Heathrow Airport.
BA operations director Gareth Kirkwood and customer services director David Noyes are to go after hundreds of flights were cancelled and thousands of passengers lost their bags in the fiasco.
BA, which said it would now appoint a chief operations officer combining both roles, said in a statement that the departures "follow the airline's move to Terminal 5".
Company (CPNY3.SA - news) spokesman Michael Johnson declined to comment on whether the two men resigned or were sacked and could not say when they would be leaving.
The new terminal opened on March 27 but was immediately hit by problems with its new baggage handling system.
It (Frankfurt: A0MLX5 - news) was not until April 8 that BA was able to offer a full short-haul flight schedule in and out of the terminal, which cost 4.3 billion pounds to build.
Almost all of BA's long-haul flights from Heathrow had been due to switch to terminal five from April 30 but the change has now been delayed until June.
The chaos has cost the airline at least 16 million pounds, according to its own estimates.
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