March 16th - Masks At Airports And On Flights
Simon Calder's Independent Travel Podcast
The Independent
3.6 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 16 March 2022
⏱️ 7 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The UK's leading airport, Heathrow, has ended the requirement for passengers to wear masks in the terminals. In a statement, the airport said it “strongly encourages those at the airport to continue wearing a face-covering – particularly when coming into close contact with others”. I've come to Heathrow to see how it feels to wander around mask-free, and how other passengers are reacting to the policy change.
Of course this podcast is completely free, as is my weekly travel email. You can sign up at independent.co.uk/newsletters.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Simon Calder, welcoming you to my independent travel podcast, bringing you the latest news on travelling, whether you're just dreaming of a great escape or making plans for one, which of course might involve flying in or out of the UK's leading airport, Heathrow. I say leading in terms of it having far more |
| 0:24.3 | flights and passengers than any other airport in the nation. Well, as from today the 16th of March, |
| 0:34.1 | you don't need to wear a mask in the terminal. It's been relaxed by the airport. They say they |
| 0:44.1 | strongly encourage people still to wear masks and they even say that masks are available |
| 0:50.8 | if you haven't got one and you feel you need one. Well I've spent quite a lot of the day at Heathrow and it felt very strange wandering through an airport without a mask on. I'm pretty sure that over certainly the past 21 months, there have not been to an airport where you did not have to |
| 1:16.5 | wear a mask. And so therefore, the idea that you go back to where we were two years ago, |
| 1:23.5 | with masks simply not necessary, felt very, very odd. |
| 1:29.1 | I was interested to see what passengers thought of it. |
| 1:33.2 | And to a woman and a man, they didn't know that things had changed. |
| 1:38.6 | I would estimate that about 80% of people were wearing masks. |
| 1:42.7 | But talking to the staff there, |
| 1:46.6 | vast majority of whom had masks on, |
| 1:49.0 | they just said, yeah, it's been like this for a while. |
| 1:52.0 | That's about the right proportion. |
| 1:55.8 | So no tremendous changes, |
| 1:59.6 | although I imagine as word gets around that more and more people will stop wearing masks. |
| 2:03.7 | Now, one thing I particularly don't like about wearing masks at airports is the fact that you're |
| 2:11.0 | inevitably getting on a flight. And if you're getting on a long haul flight, well, that's |
| 2:16.4 | going to be even more uncomfortable. |
| 2:19.2 | I mean, of course, I flew from London via Tokyo to Sydney, and that was 25 hours or so, all of which was |
| 2:29.6 | masks were required. So how interesting it would be to go on a long-haul flight without a mask? |
| 2:36.9 | Well, a number of people have found out just that today. The first flight just went out shortly after |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Independent, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Independent and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.