Heathrow Airport: Race to resurface the runway

More than 200 engineers and technicians have just completed a once in a decade project to resurface the Southern Runway at Heathrow, as part of a £100 million investment in the airfield in 2024.

Work on the 50m wide 3659m long runway, which is the equivalent to around 40 football pitches, is timed meticulously to happen overnight while flights are not scheduled and finished in time for the first aircraft to take off or land back on the runway at 06:00.

Why does this happen?

The last time the runway was resurfaced was 2014. There are around 1,300 combined take offs and landings a day at Heathrow. Most common aircraft weigh around 200 tonnes, travelling about 140mph when touching down - this forceful impact results in 5-10kg of rubber being left on the runway from the aircraft tyres.

This means the runway must be resurfaced every 10 years to ensure that it can sustain the loads imposed and has the performance criteria to operate aircraft safely.

It took 4 years to plan for this which includes the investigation, design, procurement and mobilisation before the resurfacing project can commence.

What is involved?

The works are complicated, with a night shift team accessing the runway from 23:00-05:30 for 29 weeks. They have to plan carefully around greater demand periods, particularly since Heathrow just recorded its busiest summer on record.

Despite only having around five hours, each night approximately 850 tonnes of asphalt is removed and replaced before the first aircraft start arriving. Each nightshift involves more than 120 heavy vehicles and equipment, over 150 operatives, and complex planning with Airfield Operations, NATS, Security and Heathrow Engineering.

The engineering firm VolkerFitzpatrick, one of the leading engineering and construction companies in the UK who employ over 3,500 across the country, began the runway resurfacing in April and completed in October.

The task list included:

• Laying approximately 50,000 tonnes of asphalt
• Replacing about 1100 runway lights with more energy-efficient LED units
• Cutting over 7 million metres of grooves into the surface to aid drainage
• Upgrading 22 entry exit taxiways and the runway shoulders which is almost the same surface area as the runway

In line with Heathrow's sustainability goals, all material is brought to the local Colnbrook centre by rail with only the final journey airside being by road. 70,000 tonnes of planed asphalt from the project has also been taken off-site to be processed and reused in local road resurfacing or used in other similar facilities across the country.

Gawaine Yates, Delivery Project Manager, said: "We've invested over £4 billion from 2022 into 2026 to make Heathrow an extraordinary airport, and the runway resurfacing project is just the latest project to make that a reality. It's an unbelievably interesting project - something of this scale is very complex and clearly comes with a number of potential operational challenges. Everything has been carefully planned for minimum impact and maximum benefit, we wanted to complete the work as quickly and safely as possible. Ensuring the runway is in the best possible condition is key for our airport in ensuring we make every journey better for passengers and maintain our high standards."

What's next?

Heathrow Airport is preparing for its busiest Christmas period to date, after welcoming a record breaking 30m passengers from June to September.

With better weather and visibility conditions between April and October, work to resurface the Northern Runway is planned to begin in April 2025.