Europe in chaos as volcano shuts airports

Airports across Europe shut down as the cloud of volcanic dust from Iceland's volcano with an unpronounceable name spread south and eastwards.

Early this morning, the airports at Amsterdam, Paris, London, Vienna, Copenhagen and many others were still closed.

Thousands of flights have been cancelled, causing chaotic scenes across the continent. The volcanic cloud was expected to dissipate today but it will take days to restore schedules.

The transport of aircargo has also been severely affected. Most of the cargo between Asia and Europe travels in the bellies of passenger aircraft and with so many cancellations of scheduled flights, forwarders are reporting severe cargo bottlenecks at airports in Asia.

In points as far away as Australia and Argentina, aircraft bound for Europe have been grounded too.

Non-emergency flights in Britain were cancelled, and most will stay grounded until at least midday Friday, and authorities in Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Belgium also closed their air space. France shut down 24 airports, including the main hub of Charles de Gaulle in Paris, Germany's Berlin and Hamburg were shut Thursday evening, and several flights out of the US had to double back, AP reported.

The UK's National Air Traffic Services (NATS) reported: "The cloud of volcanic ash continues to cover much of the UK and the eruption in Iceland continues. Following a review of the latest information, NATS advises that restrictions will remain in place in UK controlled airspace until 19:00 (UK time) today, Friday 16-Apr-2010, at the earliest."

"In general, the situation cannot be said to be improving with any certainty as the forecast affected area appears to be closing in from east to west. We continue to work closely with airports, airlines, and the rest of Europe to understand and mitigate the implications of the volcanic eruption".

A leading vulcanologist said the ash could cause problems to air traffic for up to 6 months if the eruption continued, but even if short-lived the financial impact on airlines could be significant, Reuters reported.

The volcano began erupting on Wednesday for the second time in a month from below the Eyjafjallajokull glacier, hurling a plume of ash 6 to 11 kilometres into the atmosphere.

Volcanic ash contains tiny particles of glass and pulverised rock that can damage engines and airframes.

In 1982 a British Airways jumbo jet lost power in all its engines when it flew into an ash cloud over Indonesia, gliding towards the ground before it was able to restart its engines.

The incident prompted the aviation industry to rethink the way it prepared for ash clouds, resulting in international contingency plans activated on Thursday.

(Source: www.schednet.com)