My daughter is flying to Heathrow next week on American. She needs to meet up with her professor and another student who are arriving within an hour of each other (hopefully) coming in on British Air and United.

Can anyone come up with a failproof (Ha!) central place to meet, and possibly a backup plan of where to leave messages?

My backup will be for all to buy phone cards and call me and I'll guide them, but I have no idea what might be central etc. once you come out of International arrivals and possibly in different locations.

Thanks.

UA and AA flights use T3. Assuming the BA flight is from the U.S., it'll most likely arrive at T4 which is a runway across from T1,2&3.

Easiest place for the 2 arriving on UA and AA to meet is the seating area immediately right as they leave the customs hall and meld into the waiting throngs. The pax arriving on BA should make him/her way to T3 by taking the Heathrow Express (every 15 mins) to T1, 2 & 3 and wait, look for them in this area.


Vote to move this to the London forum.

Incredibly helpful!! I love this place.

Okay, tell me where the London forum is...

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=464

It's a sub-forum of the Western Europe forum. Apparently London ain't part of the UK & Ireland no more

I am not familiar with this airline. Are you sure they fly to Heathrow?

Hmmm...my daughter definitely is on AA. The professor is on BA.

Both are leaving from Florida but the other student is coming from home. Perhaps the United portion is domestic only. They'd better find out her LHR connection. Thanks for the heads up. (I was searching all terminals on the LHR site, but it was unhelpful compared the brilliant folks here.)

BA=British Airways (not British Air)

Don't forget that the UK requires both parties to, at the time of meeting at LHR, carry a newspaper, wear a trench coat, and have a secret password, such as
"the birds must be flying to the north this time of year" to which the response is something like "but only in the northern hemisphere". At which time one party checks his/her baggage claim tag number and sees that it matches the number plate (license plate) of the car picking him/her up. Afterward, jump in the car, drive away quickly, and see Boris and Natasha's car chase after you.

From the thread title, I was expecting something more risque...

Wrong London airport. Do a search on the BA forum for 'LGW' and 'shower'.....at your peril

Oh, just my way of referring to BOAC.

The funny thing is I actually write stuff like that! (I had a fairly popular spy novel awhile back...and BA was in it...and they gave me a free flight as thanks.)

There are a huge number of Borises and Natashas in London nowadays, if they chase after you it's probably to put in an offer on your house.

Regarding the OP's question, be aware that although most BA flights from the US do indeed arrive at T4, those from Los Angeles and San Francisco arrive at T1, and from Miami at T3. T1 is an-about 10-minute walk through passages to T3. If you are coming from other BA flights into T4 you do need to take the Heathrow Express train. No fares are charged for the in-airport section from T4 to T1, 2 and 3, just hop on board.

My suggestion for a T3 meeting place would have been exactly the same as YVR Cockroaches. There's a coffee and snack counter there (few airports are so sensible as to provide this at the meeting area - Heathrow's not ALL bad) and the seating gives a view of passengers as they come out. Be aware it's quite a large overall area and there are usually hundreds of people milling about.

The details of the T3 arriving flights are displayed on screens but if you want to know progress of a flight arriving at another terminal go to the airport information counter next to the seating area and they will look it up for you.