Cause of Heathrow shutdown fire still unknown, initial report says

LONDON (Reuters) -The cause of the fire at an electricity substation that forced Britain's Heathrow Airport to shut down for almost a day remains unknown, the National Energy System Operator said in an interim report on Thursday.

The closure of Heathrow, the busiest airport in Europe, on March 21 cost airlines tens of millions of pounds and stranded thousands of passengers. It also raised questions about the resilience of Britain's infrastructure.

NESO, which manages the country's electricity network, said it would produce a final report on the outage in June, with recommendations on the resilience of energy systems and plans for response and restoration.

The police said in March the fire was not suspicious. London Fire Brigade and National Grid Electricity Transmission continue to conduct forensic investigations into the cause of the fire, NESO said in the interim report.

The outage prompted scrutiny from the government, airlines and passengers, who asked why all of Heathrow's four terminals had to shut and why it took 18 hours for power to be restored.

Heathrow said it hoped the final report would provide answers on the cause of the fire.

"Further clarity on how the fire started and why two transformers were subsequently impacted can help ensure greater resilience for the UK's energy grid moving forward," the airport said in a statement.

(Reporting by Muvija M and Sarah Young; Editing by Catarina Demony aqnd Paul Sandle)

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