Euro Air-travel Disrupted by Iceland Volcano.

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One of my

dearest friends is stuck in the USA right now. I'm covering those parts of her business I am competent to handle, German friends are picking up what they can. Two of my colleagues at the university had to cancel their flight to Canada, friends who were just in Holland are driving back home in a rental car at outrageous prices.

My next flight to the US is still a ways out. It's going to get worse before it gets better.

We have a haze over the city of Munich, very unusual.

I notice the fundamentalist Christians are discussing this as a sign that the world is coming to an end. Scientists are quietly suggesting that the SO² discharge, if this goes on long enough, might buy us a bit of cooling.

Who needs Tea-leaves when you have BILD-Zeitung?

panthera++4-17-2010-09-39-32.jpg
 
Thousands...

Business collegues are in Zurich, due to fly out yesterday Friday morn, where told to go back to hotel & wait, Swiss Air will pay hotel fees, last update is flights will not resume until tuesday!!!!!...

Managed to book them on Eurostar channell tunnel train leaving Paris Saturday night!!!, so all they needed to do was get fast train from Zurich to Paris...but guess what, National Train Stike in France.... no trains!!! thebiggest chance of the year to make money & fill the trains!!! can you believe it, what would happen in an emergency one asks!!!(if this isnt)

Last update, they used initiative and clubbed together with others to hire coach from Zurich to London, 12hrs travel, but between them same fee as train!!!

And all airlines now saying will pay no more fees from this point on as this upset is now classed as "Act of God"

Funny all the travellers mentioned a sense of errie forboding around them, as if "you`re on your own folks" because we cant battle Mother Nature!!!
 
Hopefully all this will blow over sometime soon.

Meanwhile not only are travelers adversely affected, but also commercial air transport. Also the airlines themselves can be expected to take a substantial financial hit with all the cancellations, refunds, comped hotel rooms, etc. Some that are marginal may go under, I suppose.

The situation is so bad in Iceland that they can't even fly over the volcano to see how much more of the glacier is expected to melt. It's the melted water that is causing the lava to explode and form most of the dust cloud, apparently.
 
We been pwned by Mother Nature! I mean, I wasn't thrilled with Bjork's last album either, but this reaction seems a bit over-the-top.

Get it? Over the top? A volcano?

Alright, I'll shut up, now. Oh, wait---one more thing.

I have one-upped the end-times crowd: I say "The world's going to end, today!" every morning when I wake up. When it finally does happen, I'm taking credit for the prognostication, damn it, LOL!
 
The airlines

are in a difficult situation.

Delta learned very quickly that their sweet little game of telling stranded travellers that they were playing by the rules and they should have read their contracts nearly killed the company the first part of this century.

On the other hand, at some point the airlines can't be expected to make up for natural disasters.

And every day they can't fly, they lose 10s of millions...

We'll be paying for this for years to come in higher ticket prices and reduced competition - I agree, the marginal carriers won't survive this.

Why can't we get ocean travel up and running at practical levels again?
 
There are air routes available from the US to Europe over the Atlantic, just a lot further south than normal.
The problem is that if there is an ash cloud over your departure airport, you can't leave. Some airports are opening for short periods of time letting out a few departures.

At this point we can be thankful that the ash hasn't begun to accumulate on the ground yet under the clouds. That will come later and it will be a real mess.

I am sure by now you heard of the British Airways 747 that encountered an ash cloud over Indonesia back in 82'. It sandblasted all the paint off the plane and shut down all the engines. Fortunately, they were able to squeak enough power out of the engines at the end to make an emergency landing.

It doesn't help that Iceland is a bankrupt country owing many countries in Europe money. People in Europe are now saying "Send us Cash, Not Ash!"

One thing the travelers in Europe can be thankful for, foreign
air carriers are required to take better care of their passengers than U.S. carriers are. This accounts for them being put up in hotels by the airlines. If this were to happen here, the airline would tell you "Tough luck, act of God" and send you on your way!

And finally, some airlines in Europe may go into sever financial distress after being grounded for so long. If the airplane isn't flying, it isn't making money. Starting Monday some carriers will begin laying off its employees until this is over.
 
I did a fair amount of air travel connected with my job in the 90's. Probably at least four trips a year across the USA and sometimes to Japan or Europe. After I got a DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis) following a flight to Minneapolis around 1999, I decided to cut back on my air travel as much as possible. Plus I got real tired of the airport and hotel routine - and that was before 9/11 and all the beefed up security. Now I have a career that requires little to no air travel, and I don't miss it one bit.

The only time I had a hotel room offered for a cancellation was for a flight to Japan. I was not pleased as I had arranged in advance to be at the Suzuka Race Circuit on a Saturday, the day before the Grand Prix, and then go again on Sunday for the racing. The flight was on a Friday and the cancellation meant I'd be a day late. Anyway, I turned down the hotel room and asked for a ride back to my home - my company had provided me with limo service from home to the airport and I thought I'd sleep better at home than in an airport hotel. I figured a ride would be cheaper for the airline than a hotel room. United had a real problem with that, but after I argued a while they finally sent me home in a very dilapidated and filthy van - but at least I got home. The next day the plane was fixed (leaky fuel filler cap) and the rest of the trip went uneventfully. I wound up staying in Japan for a month instead of the scheduled week or two because of problems at the job site, but that's another story. For that and other reasons I'm not too fond of United. My best flying experiences were on Virgin Atlantic.
 
Well, if you want to come to Amsterdam through the air: use a hot air balloon or a glider. These are still allowed modes of transport.

The Dutch airline KLM has made a test flight today at an altitude of 13 kilometers while taking air samples. The results are currently examined. The airlines are also investigating the possibilities of low-altitude (ca. 3 kilometers) flights as the ash can remain in the air for days to come.

I haven't noticed anything out of the ordinary with this ash cloud over our heads. It's invisible from the ground, today was a beautiful day with full sunshine all day long. I have looked at the sunset yesterday and the day before as it was supposed to be more intensely coloured because of the ash and again didn't notice anything special.
 
Ash cloud coverage...

Keven, using your link I found that this morning the ash covered a large part of Central Europe, including the whole of the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Poland and other countries.

mielabor++4-17-2010-16-38-38.jpg.png
 
Sunset...

Also, this picture that was taken on April 15 in the neighbourhood of Amsterdam shows a spectacular sunset. Well, I didn't see anything like it. Actually, I have seen nicer sunsets without ash in the air.

mielabor++4-17-2010-16-44-41.jpg
 
Yeah,

I just gets more and more interesting. Your area of Europe, however, is listed as quite a bit less dense than, for instance, just to the south of us here in Munich. That's what I find so interesting.

When Chernobyl went up in the 1980's, the Bavarian government (conservative, of course) lied to the public about it saying there was no danger of any wind driven radioactive contamination.

We later lost thousands of young children to leukämia...

The nice thing about the internet is that, today, we can actually see for ourselves how things are developing. I'm in a very low part of the city, but have a very wide view out to the horizon and you can definitely see the haze, sort of like Berlin back in the bad-old brown coal days, if not yet that bad.

I find it interesting that Ben Franklin noted the famine and cold weather the last major volcanic eruption produced in France a while back. Strange how quickly we have gone from a scientifically curious culture to dumbed-down.

Maybe this little poke in the ribs from Mother Nature will serve as an illustration that there really is such a thing as global warming...
 
Even When Air Space Opens

It could take weeks to get things back on track. Crews and planes have to move where they are supposed to be, and with various laws in all countries regarding how long a crew can work, somethings this is not always easy.

With the demise of trans-Atlantic ocean liner service, persons really are really just out of luck in trying to get from Europe/UK to the US and vice-versa. Shame really, it takes about three days or a bit less to cross, and even if you left on Friday or this weekend via ship, you still would arrive on either side of the pond faster than waiting until flights resume. Say this because news reports tonight state it could be Thursday or Friday of next week at the best some persons stuck in the NYC area could fly out.
 
Act Of God

Oh yes, news reports tonight pretty much echoed that stranded passengers have little or no recourse to get at the airlines for anything. In all truth aside from whatever kindess they wish to extend, this event falls under "Act of God", and so airlines are not compelled to do anything, this includes refunds, hotel arrangements, etc.
 
The sunsets will be spectacular indeed!

The eruption of Mount Pinotubo in 1991 provided the most amazing sunsets for a couple of years after.

As far as 'buying us a bit of cooling' goes - I hope not. The weather here has been divine and we've had the best rainfalls in a decade. If there is any cooling let it remain in the northern hemisphere.
 
That's very inconvenient, I'm supposed to get back to Bologna tomorrow but the airport is still closed and I'm stuck on the opposite part of Italy... The train is a NO NO as they're all booked and I wouldn't do a trip of almost 8 hours standing up in a doorway in a eurostar!
 
Gabriele,

I am sorry to hear that.

Eurostars are OK for a five minute trip from here to there IF you are 1)Alone in the wagon.
2)No idiot has smoked on the "smoking" side of the wagon (the Austrians kept that one up until recently).
3) There is actually someone or a computer to buy a ticket from.

I have never taken a train in the South of Italy without having to pay some "penalty" or other because the ticket was either "wrong" or the "date" was stale or my tennis shoes had velcro and not shoe laces...

This is the first (and probably the only) time I have ever had anything bad to say about anything Italian, but the train system in Italy is no fun.

Good Luck!
 
Rush Limbaugh

also found an explanation for his tea-party and ditto-head followers:
Europe is suffering because the Americans passed the health-care act.

God is punishing us "socialists" over here to show you folks over "there" how angry he is for us providing medical care to all humans.

I sometimes wonder if it isn't us in the Northern Hemisphere who are upside down.

http://www.politicususa.com/en/limbaugh-volcano-iceland
 
Panthera:

you can say all the bad things you want about any train, anywhere in Italy! The prices are absurdly high and the service is very poor! The only thing that keeps "trenitalia" alive is monopoly... and now they said they're going to buy the French TGV...

The only good thing is that all the trains are smoke-free since 1995!
 
I hate that!
I'm stuck and the airport is still closed! And tomorrow morning I was supposed to have and exam at the university! God, I hope I can make it home by the 24th as I don't want to miss the 25th of April celebrations! And I have already booked the restaurant!!!
 
I wouldn't count on the Iceland volcano (with the unpronounceable name) causing global spectacular sunsets.

Unlike Pinatubo, the Iceland volcano is relatively puny. Or that's what I'm reading. But it sure is coughing up a lot of trouble.
 
Rich,

Relatively speaking, yes, it is small.
Two caveats. One, it is right next door to a seriously major volcano, the name of which I can't even spell with this keyboard much less pronounce, which is way overdue for another eruption.

Two, it may be 'small', but these volcanoes have been known to go on at this level for many months at a time. We saw a famine in Central Europe in the early 19th century because of them.

What scares me is the pressure being put on politicians to loosen up the air corridors.

European politicians are more sensible than American politicians for one simple reason - they are ALL on the take here and All decisions are based on their financial welfare and NOBODY in Europe pretends otherwise.

If the airline$ can make the ca$e that it i$ financially $afe to take the ri$k, the politician$ will open tho$e corridor$ right over the volcano, it$elf.

The only thing holding folks back right now is not the facts, it is the crash of that Polish flight two weeks ago.
 
Yesterday the Finnish Air Force sent up a jet to test the air, it came back with moderate engine damage. The ash junk gunked up the engines.
With engines costing over a million dollars each, the airlines don't want to risk it. They'd be replacing engines left and right.
Now the ash only goes up to 25-35K feet, so planes could safely fly over it, but you have to descend through it to land.
 
Yes, but, Allen

That was a Finnish airplane, not a real German plane, according to the asshats at AirBerlin who are demanding we open our airspace.
They don't care about the planes - they're only rented, after all, they don't care about the passengers - we don't do million dollar settlements like in America - all they care about is their short term profit. So what if one or two crash?

This is a real chance for the pilot's unions and sensible people to reinstitute some sensible regulation in an industry which has been deregulated to the point of being dangerous.

Someone pointed out in a large newspaper here this morning that one reason the politician$ are thinking of the people first (for a change) is because the UK elections are on and there is a major German provincial election coming up. The consequences of the ruling party in either country opening the corridors and then having people killed would hurt in the only way that matters to politician$. They'd lose parliamentary seats.

We need to seriously rethink travel. I fly a lot, and security means a lot to me. We need more than one viable way to get from here to there, the Hindenburg disaster was a million years ago, time to rethink everything.
 
Panthera

Don't think the Polish crash has anything to do with this, European airliners have gone down before without shutting down much of the air space.

To my mind it just shows the huge difference between how EU and the US goverments view things, especially when it comes to saftey.

American businesses for the most part are left to make decisions (within rules and laws), on their own judgement,and as much of the economy here is in priviate hands, goverment tends only to get involved when there are clear risks, such as during and after 9/11/01. USA airlines though face a much more court happy society, and if something happened you can bet there would be lawsuits that blame an airline for sending the flight when it should have known better.

Europe on the other hand is much more proactive and is heavily involved in all businesses, also is much less willing to leave safety up to corporations.

The test done so far, at least according to published media reports involve flying well below the ash clouds or into gaps.

Since on one can accurately predict wind patterns, and or how long or intense this spewing of ash is supposed go on on, I for one wouldn't want to take off from JFK because things are "fine" in France, only to have conditions change during the six or so hours it takes to cross the Atlantic, what does one do then?

Some airlines are saying they may start flying more and larger planes into the open southern European airports to at least get some passengers across the pond, and some Americans home. The UK is talking about using the Royal Navy to ferry it's citizens from various points in the EU home.

As thing stand now, even if the ash situation clears up today and or the ban is lifted, it is going to take a week or much longer at least to get this mess sorted out.
 
Today several European airlines sent up planes to pove that

Apparently they came back with no indication of engine wear or damage and now they are howling to have European airspace re-opened. They are saying that it is safe to fly above 30,000 feet. The European aviation authority is not convinced and keeping the airspace closed for at least another 24 hours. I understand that financial losses are significant and some airlines have been standing down several thousand staff, but human safety comes first. Though one can see that some are quite prepared to risk the loss of a plane or two for the sake of PROFIT. I guess the potential loss of a plane full of people, over two hundred million dollars a day, is a manageable risk.

Olav
 

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