Volcanic Disruption

What a strange day it has been, so quiet in the skies above west London. Bad luck Richard, I hope that you manage to get home soon.

Eurocontrol are estimating that as many as 6000 flights were canceled today due to the ash and with Nats shutting UK airspace till 1300 local tomorrow the problem looks set to continue. The Met office are seeing no change in the near future with the ash possibly remaining over northern Europe for the next 48 hours.

I have attached some pictures of the red sunset in the UK last night to the story in the news section.
http://www.flightcrewfinder.com/news/volcanic-ash-causing-major-disrupti...

The red sky was caused by the ash cloud and the photos are looking west, towards Heathrow, from Richmond Hill in London. In the third photo the bank of 'cloud' the sun is disappearing behind in in fact a layer of volcanic ash.

Also, below is the most up to date graphic showing the progression of the volcanic ash, from the Met Office carrying out its duteis as the London Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre (VAAC). Unfortunately, it does seem to be showing that the ash is here for a while.

Sadly, all of the information that seems to be coming out is more bad news. Below is the most up to date forecast of the movement of the ash cloud:

An interesting thing I have found on the internet today regarding the volcanic ash cloud is a video from the BBC of 'an ash plane' sent up to analyse UK airspace at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8626625.stm

IATA have released a statement saying that their initial estimate for the impact on the airlines is "in excess of US$200 million per day in lost revenue". This figure however does not include the extra costs suffered by the carriers for looking after passengers and repositioning aircraft once flying resumes. There is also fear amongst some airlines that they will be forced to fly before the ash has completely cleared from the atmosphere which could cause significant damage to engines.

KLM, this evening, flew a Boeing 737 to test the affect of the ash on the aircraft. Their CEO, who was on board the aircraft during the flight, later claimed that "flying is not now dangerous". The aircraft involved in the test is being examined and findings should be available tomorrow morning.

Other airlines are now starting to worry about how they are going to manage the significant financial impact. Ryanair are looking at potentially laying people off next week, while Finnair will stop paying employees if the problem continues. SAS have already warned 2500 employees about potential layoffs, as reported here: http://www.thelocal.se/26124/20100417/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium...

Where are you Richard?

I hope everyone is looking forward to some good old British grown produce as no more Fruit and Vegetables can be imported by air at the moment!

I've seen reports that the UK is already starting to run out of some fruit and veg.

As the airlines start to find ways of resuming operations the BBC have reported that they are pushing for a review of the current restrictions http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8628323.stm

However, here is an interesting article in the Times interviewing Captain Eric Moody. He says that “If you find yourself flying into a cloud of ash turn away and get out of there as soon as you can.” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/article7098307.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&a...

I'm now home. It was a rush but I have made it back 6 days later than planned.

An interesting Q&A article from the BBC discussing what EU aviation can learn from the closure of European Airspace due to volcanic ash. It looks like, as a result, reform of the air traffic system may be pushed with members meeting next week to discuss the options.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8637729.stm

Here is a link to a really good visualization of the European airspace get back to normal after last months closures. http://bit.ly/crHr0v

Lets hope that that the closures of the last few days don't continue and that the volcano's increased activity yesterday doesn't bring more misery to European airlines.