Asphalt and particularly high temperatures or intense sunlight are not good friends. Truck drivers have known this for a long time, because the surface becomes soft and under load, so-called ruts can appear on motorways, which are expensive to repair. In the United Kingdom, the first runways are now giving up.

London Luton Airport, where Wizz Air UK and Easyjet are the top dogs, suffered surface damage on Monday afternoon due to the heat. Both the runways and the apron itself were affected. The asphalt surface could no longer withstand the high temperatures and strong sunlight and became soft.

Too soft to safely roll on commercial aircraft. For security reasons, numerous flights had to be diverted to other airports in the United Kingdom. Some carriers also canceled connections completely. It is still unclear to what extent Luton's infrastructure has been permanently damaged by the high temperatures. This has yet to be determined by experts.

There is no improvement to be expected in the next few days due to the heat wave. The Civil Aviation Authority assumes that other UK airports whose aprons or runways have asphalt surfaces could also have problems. Those that have concrete as the surface are more likely to be "safe" as this building material is less susceptible to changes at high temperatures.

According to Sky News, the incident in London-Luton is not an isolated case. It is reported that the asphalt at Brize Norton Airport, which is used by the military, has literally given way to its knees. The surface would have literally melted away, so that flight operations had to be stopped for safety reasons. Here too: asphalt that is too soft simply cannot withstand the stresses caused by airplanes. Like trucks, the machines can literally “sink in”.