'Devastated, annoyed': SFO passengers among thousands impacted by Heathrow Airport closure

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- Passengers across the world are being impacted by the widespread disruption at London's Heathrow Airport due to a massive fire and power outage.

That includes passengers flying out of the Bay Area to Europe's busiest airport as hundreds of flights are impacted by the outage.

Video shows flames shooting high into the air at an electrical substation near the London airport, knocking out power.

RELATED: London's Heathrow Airport closed for the day after a substation fire, disrupting travel

After completely shutting down for hours, Heathrow Airport said it would begin flights for passengers stranded when their flights were diverted to other airports in Europe and to get airplanes back in the right place. It hopes to be in full operation on Saturday.

Overnight Friday, a flight from SFO to Heathrow was diverted and returned to San Francisco. Many people on that flight were on their way home after the Nvidia conference that just happened in San Jose.

"I'm devastated, annoyed. I know these things can happen, it just had to happen on the one time I was coming home," passenger Jamie White said. "I promised my son I would be seeing him shortly and now I've got to wait any number of days until I can get home."

Instead of making it home, White got a hotel voucher to stay another night.

"My first time here in the United States and I was really excited and now I just really want to go home and see my children," White said.

Another flight from SFO on its way to Heathrow was diverted to Washington Dulles overnight.

On Friday, all incoming flights from Heathrow were canceled.

Most outgoing flights on Friday afternoon now depend on the London airport reopening on time.

"If Heathrow in advance comes out with information that says, we're not going to make that 5 p.m. local deadline, it's going to take us longer to get the airport reopened, then that will obviously have an effect on those departing flights from SFO, so a lot hangs in the balance in the next couple of hours," Doug Yakel, a spokesperson for SFO said.

SFO is now advising all passengers expecting to head to London, to keep in close touch with your airline for the status of your flight.

"Obviously no airline wants to put their passengers through some type of exercise of getting on the airplane and pushing back and then knowing, so they want to make this decision in a timeline that allows passengers to know about it well in advance," Yakel said.

United Airlines says that it is offering a travel waiver to its customers while Heathrow is closed so that they can switch to eligible flights to Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris or Edinburgh.