London Heathrow Airport’s (LHR) plans to relocate multiple airlines’ terminals have caused frustration among carriers. Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian commented on this Monday, Nov. 2, 2026, stating that the decision to move Delta away from a shared terminal with Virgin Atlantic was “deeply disappointing and bad for airline consumers”.
Heathrow makes new changes to terminals
Delta Air Lines will be moved out of Terminal 3 and into Terminal 4 in 2028, which will separate it from its shared terminal with Virgin Atlantic. There are five terminals to change in 2028, and the affected airlines will be:
- Delta Air Lines
- Japan Airlines
- Finnair
These airlines are currently located at Terminal 3 and will be moving to Terminal 4. Other changes will include China Southern relocating to Terminal 5 from Terminal 4 and LATAM, which is currently in Terminal 3, moving to Terminal 2.
LHR’s reasoning behind the changes is to achieve optimal capacity utilisation and to improve the passenger experience by distributing traffic more efficiently.
This has caused a dispute with some airlines, such as Virgin Atlantic, which rejected the change. The carrier’s CEO, Corneel Koster, according to Sky News, stated that,
“If implemented in 2028, Heathrow’s decision to separate Delta Air Lines from Virgin Atlantic, moving Delta to the remotely located Terminal 4, would create friction for customers, weaken competition and reduce choice.”
Virgin Atlantic is part of a partnership with Delta Air Lines through a joint venture formed in 2019; this includes Delta owning a 49% stake in Virgin Atlantic, mostly on transatlantic routes from the U.S. and the UK. Many operations between the two carriers are jointly coordinated, and shared operations such as schedules, lounges and loyalty points across both airlines are split between both carriers, depending on the flight.
They also share a codeshare agreement which allows both airlines to sell seats on the other’s flight under its own flight number.
Delta Air Lines to separate from Terminal 3
Delta Air Lines spoke out against the separation too, with CEO Ed Bastian saying,
“Separating our operation undermines years of investment and disregards the tightly integrated customer benefits that we offer in our co-located terminal”
