An ‘underwhelming’ sign at Heathrow Airport welcoming visitors to the United Kingdom has got the internet talking after the popular Very British Problems meme account on Facebook took aim at the display for the lackluster effort that had been put into it.
“The ‘Welcome to Britain’ display at Heathrow is a bit underwhelming,” the meme account said about the sign, which is dwarfed by its surroundings. “And that’s nothing against the person in the photo or the message. But it could be a bit… I don’t know… bigger? Or have all the letters visible?” the post continued.
In a follow-up message, Very British Problems joked, “I’m guessing someone charged about £100k for designing and building it.”
The post quickly drew a quick response from hundreds of people mocking the sign, as well as thousands of reactions to the original Facebook post. The real purpose of the display, however, is a lot more sinister than anyone has yet realized.
In fact, the display is actually a bulletproof sign or, in security and defense lingo, a mobile ballistic shield designed to help law enforcement repel a major terrorist attack by heavily armed assailants.
These types of shields are used at a number of major airports around the world, so this isn’t a unique issue to Heathrow, but the airport probably wanted its ballistic shields not to scare visitors and opted to repurpose them for secondary use as something a lot more welcoming.
The jokes from some commentators about the cost of this display are, then, probably quite true. This type of ballistic defense system won’t have come cheap, and one hopes that its true purpose will never be needed… a ‘Welcome to Britain’ sign, no matter how disappointing, seems like a very good second job.
Heathrow Airport has, though, faced a wave of fresh criticism over the lack of investment in its terminals and passenger experience, with airlines increasingly frustrated by the record-high fees that the airport imposes on carriers.
The Heathrow Airline Operators’ Committee, which represents more than 90 airlines that use the airport, is also threatening legal action against Heathrow’s owners if they don’t compensate airlines for the mass disruption that was caused by an electricity substation fire that shuttered the airport for an entire day.
Heathrow has promised to make significant investments to improve the passenger experience while also improving the service it provides to airlines, although operators fear renewed talk of a third runway will mean that Heathrow starts demanding even higher fees from airlines.
A campaign group called ‘Heathrow Reimagined’ has called on the Civil Aviation Authority to launch a fundamental review of the way that the airport is funded, with 9 in 10 airlines agreeing that the way Heathrow is run has impacted its effectiveness as a hub airport.
“Airline representatives cite negative passenger experiences, long security lines, poor service offered by the airport for passengers with restricted mobility (PRM), high costs, and baggage systems failures as key concerns,” a report from the group claimed.
“Instead of being a source of national pride, Heathrow has failed to modernize and, in turn, lets down consumers, carriers, and the British economy,” slammed Nigel Wicking, chief executive of the Heathrow AOC.
“This research, which represents a significant number of the airlines operating at Heathrow, in every Terminal, reaffirms the need for an urgent and fundamental review by the CAA.”
Click bait…!!
What’s sinister about that?