LONDON, Aug. 12 (Xinhuanet) -- Thousands of holidaymakers have been stranded at London's biggest Heathrow airport after British Airways (BA) cancelled all its flights into and out of the airportbecause of a strike staged by baggage handlers.

    The suspension will last till at least 6 p.m. as several hundred baggage handlers, loaders, cargo staff and other workers at the airport started a strike Thursday in support of 800 employees sacked by the US firm Gate Gourmet, which supplies catering for BA.

    Up to 70,000 passengers are stranded and hundreds of them had to sleep overnight in the terminals as all the hotels were full.

    "Because we have not had sufficient airport staff to operate flights into or out of Heathrow, nearly 100 of our aircraft and 1,000 pilots and cabin crew are in the wrong places around the worldand we simply cannot mount a robust operation any earlier," said BA Chief Executive Rod Eddington.

    "It is a huge disappointment to us that we have become embroiled in someone else's dispute," he added.

    The Transport and General Workers Union accused Gate Gourmet ofacting in a "disgraceful" fashion and called on BA to exert pressure on the firm to resolve the dispute.

    However, overnight talks failed to break the deadlock after Gate Gourmet insisted the sacked workers would not be reinstated.

    The sacked workers are expected to hold a mass meeting at Heathrow Friday to decide their next move in the increasingly bitter row.

    Mick Temple, managing director of Heathrow said there was likely to be "significant disruption" for several days for BA passengers.

    "I would strongly advise everybody to just check because I could be saying something now which is clearly wrong in a very short period of time because of the situation we're talking about," he said.

    Also being affected airlines included Australian carrier Qantas, Finnair and Sri Lankan Airways, which use the same baggagehandlers.

    BA operates around 550 flights a day at Heathrow at this time of the year, traditionally one of the busiest weeks for the airline industry. Enditem