'Green' BA flying empty 'ghost planes' across the Atlantic

Each one pumps out thousands of tons of CO2, in some cases almost 70 times the average adult's annual carbon footprint.

The ghost services have been flying between Britain, Canada and the U.S. over the past two weeks.

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Critics claim they are not cancelled because the company fears it might lose valuable take-off and landing slots at Heathrow and Gatwick.

But it is a severe embarrassment for a company which has trumpeted its green credentials in a high-profile advertising campaign - and which has just announced a substantial rise in the fuel surcharges it levies on passengers.

On November 4, BA Flight 179 crossed the Atlantic to New York completely empty. BA Flight 176 later flew back from the U.S. to Heathrow, also empty.

Two others left Heathrow at the weekend - Flights 093 to Toronto and 279 to Los Angeles - both Boeing 747s.

The LA flight emitted an estimated 698 tons of CO2, 350 times more than the average car in an entire year.

At least two other empty flights - including one from Gatwick to Houston - have also departed in the last couple of days.

A BA spokesman said the practice was extremely rare and occurred when its "highly-complex" rostering system meant there were no cabin crew available for a particular flight.

He said it was better to fly empty planes one way if the return leg was full, than to cancel both legs.

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He denied it operated empty services just to avoid losing its slots under "use it or lose it" rules at London airports.

Peter Lockley, of the environmental group WWF, said: "This is outrageous. British Airways claims to take its environmental responsibilities seriously, but it is spewing out hundreds of tons of unnecessary carbon just to protect its profits.

"They claim they are reducing carbon emissions but because they can't sort out their staff rotas they are flying planes without passengers and causing untold damage to our environment.

This just blows apart their green image."

In 1990, BA's total CO2 emissions stood at 10.6million tons.

By last year the figure was 16.6million.

The BA spokesman said: "Due to the highly complex rosters of our 15,000 full-time and part-time cabin crew, on very rare occasions we have experienced a lack of availability of cabin crew for certain flights.

"It has only affected approximately 0.3 per cent of our global flying programme this month.

"Nevertheless this type of decision is not made lightly and we are working very hard to rectify the issue as quickly as possible."