In fairness, LHR is not the only airport to have suffered. At one stage Brussels had to cancel all flights as they ran out of de-icer!
Additionally, apart from the aprons having to be cleared of snow, each aircraft has to swept of snow and then de-icer applied. The aircraft MUST be airborne within one hour of that application or it has to be done again.
I'm not saying that BAA has handled the situation well by any means, but it is a bit too easy for armchair folk to forget that LHR is one of the biggest airports in the world...and also that they get their pre-season advice (I believe) from the Met Office, who seem to have thought that this winter would be mild, in keeping with their AGW faith.
theres not a weather forecast in existence that is 100% reliable, its an educated guess - look at the weather data F1 teams use - they cant tell where and when its going to rain in the next 5mins let alone 5months

for my tuppence, i reckon we'll see more extremes of weather (as NASA and the MetOffice predicts) - better get used to it

there was a Norwegian Airport official on the radio said it took them approx 4mins to clear a runway after a heavy snowfall at Oslo and they hire 30-40 extra bodies in winter purely to clear snow, now I'd suggest they have a plan in place to quickly mobilise whats needed in the event of snow, but I also think you've got to look at Heathrow being too busy for its own good, UK isn't that big a country so why not spread the load around a bit?
