NOTHING characterised the chaos at Heathrow yesterday more than the sight of three middle-aged women in saris being chased across a car park by six armed policemen.

Their “offence” was having the temerity to hand out leaflets in support of sacked catering staff to frustrated passengers as they sat on the pavement waiting for their flights.

The terrified-looking women tried to hurry from the scene. After catching them, the officers, who had been called by upset British Airways staff, told the former Gate Gourmet workers to leave the airport and not to return. They were trying to highlight their problems to the thousands of tired and frustrated passengers who had been stranded overnight in the airport.

“We are the workers who provide your in-flight meals,” their leaflets said.

“We are paid just £12,000 a year. These are very low wages by any standards but especially in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Yet Gate Gourmet is seeking to push them even lower and us even closer to poverty.”

As bosses tried to resolve the dispute behind the scenes, passengers made the best they could in huge marquees outside Heathrow’s terminals, sitting on plastic garden chairs and munching on sandwiches and chocolate bars laid on by the airline.

The marquees outside Terminals 1 and 4 were packed with bleary-eyed passengers, many of whom had slept on the airport floor the previous night.

Airport staff from other departments were drafted in to distribute free food and drink, while British Airways employees dealt with hundreds of queries and complaints from frazzled travellers.

Bored passengers smirked as a three-piece band, hired by British Airport Authority to entertain them, struck up in the marquee outside Terminal 4.

Kim and Dena Jackson were also hired for the afternoon, occupying bored children with face paints and lessons in circus tricks.

Most people were remarkably phlegmatic about being stuck at the airport for hours with no end in sight and little information available. Some seemed to be enjoying the excuse to make new friends.

Jokes about similarities to supermarket shopping abounded when staff began distributing numbered tickets, which determined when travellers would be allowed back in the terminal.

Strict security ensured that very few British Airways passengers slipped back into the terminal building unauthorised, although many tried and swapped stories about their varying degrees of success.

Inside, roped-off lanes leading to British Airways check-in desks in one part of the terminal were completely deserted, but at the other end miserable and exhausted-looking passengers sat and lay in the queues where they had slept the night before. Many had unpacked luggage to sleep on. Backpackers had the advantage of sleeping bags.

Some cash points ran out of money and staff, desperate to soothe tempers, wheeled trollies laden with bagels and bottles of water between the queues; but by far the biggest complaint was of not being able to watch the cricket.

GOING NOWHERE

Yoshitumi Nagao, 42, a Japanese Paralympic champion, was stranded while trying to get to the World Championships in Helsinki. If his flight did not leave today, he could miss his 200m race tomorrow. Mr Nagao, from Kobe, has competed in five Paralympics and he won a bronze medal in the relay race in Athens last year. He said: “The other competitors are all out there already, I’m concerned that I might not get there in time. I ’ll be really disappointed if I miss it.”

Bill and Dana Holmes were booked on a flight home to Boston for their nephew’s wedding. They were told by BA staff they could fly with Virgin Atlantic instead at no extra cost and were sent from Terminal 4 to Terminal 3. But Virgin Atlantic staff said their BA tickets were not valid. Mrs Holmes, 68, said: “We’ve been completely lied to and we’re going to miss our nephew’s wedding.”

Phil Waymouth, from Bristol, spent his 31st birthday in a marquee outside Terminal 4, waiting to fly to Australia for a surfing holiday. He arrived at Heathrow on Thursday night and spent hours trying to get information from airport staff about his Qantas flight. “It’s the worst birthday I’ve ever had but I don’t think I’ll forget it.”

Meg and Arnaud Girard, from Seattle, were supposed to be taking their sons, Jake, 5, and Zach, 11, to Eurodisney but may now have to cancel that part of their trip. Mrs Girard said: “We were actually on the plane when the baggage handlers walked out. We sat on the plane for three hours before they told us to get off.”

Peter Ioannidis, 41, a Canadian restaurateur, said angry passengers almost staged a mutiny on Thursday night. “They told everybody to rebook their flights, the queue to rebook was maybe 800 people long with one person, one individual, at the front to control this queue.”

Edwin To from Hong Kong was stranded with his wife, Winnie, who is three months’ pregnant. The couple were returning from a week’s holiday in Britain. She said: “I am not feeling very well. I feel like I am having contractions.”

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