PARIS: French conglomerate Vinci said on Thursday it had bought control of Gatwick airport, Britain’s second-busiest, for nearly three billion pounds only months before Brexit.

Vinci said it will own a 50.01 per cent stake in Gatwick thanks to the deal worth 2.9 billion ($3.7 billion, 3.2 billion euros) by the end of June.

Gatwick made headlines last week when it closed its runway repeatedly due to reports of mystery drone sightings nearby, impacting nearly 140,000 passengers.

The French purchase of Gatwick, which is Europe’s eight-biggest airport and runs the busiest single runway in the world, comes ahead of Britain’s departure from the European Union on March 29.

The proximity of Brexit “probably helped us close the deal”, Nicolas Notebaert, Vinci Airports chief, told a telephone conference.

The absence of a Brexit deal with the EU could cause major air travel problems as both sides would no longer recognise each other’s aviation safety standards.

Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2018