Air travel disruption after the 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption

Approximate depiction of the ash cloud at 18:00 UTC on 21 April 2010. The current forecasts were updated at the London Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre's website (Met Office, UK).

Airspace completely (red) or partially (orange) closed to IFR traffic on 18 April 2010. Iceland's airspace remained relatively unaffected.

The second eruption of Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland on 14 April 2010 caused extensive air travel disruption. In response to fears that ash ejected by the volcano would damage aircraft engines, the controlled airspace of many countries was closed to IFR traffic in what became the largest air traffic shut-down since World War II. This action caused millions of passengers to be stranded not only in Europe, but across the world.

The eruption occurred beneath glacial ice. The cold water from the melting ice chilled the lava quickly, causing it to fragment into very small particles of glass (silica) and ash, which were carried into the eruption plume. Due to the extremely fine nature of the ash particles and the large volume of steam produced from the glacial melt water, an ash plume that is hazardous to aircraft was rapidly sent high into the upper atmosphere. The presence and location of the plume depended upon the state of the eruption and the winds. Due to the way air masses function, and because of the large volume of steam produced by this eruption, the plume was injected into the jet stream.

With large parts of European airspace closed to air traffic, many more countries were affected as flights to and from Europe were cancelled.

At 20:00 UTC on 16 April the ash cloud reached Kazakhstan. As of 17 April 2010, the eruption was continuing, but less explosively; the plume was rising to 5 kilometres (3 mi) rather than 13 kilometres (8 mi) previously; not high enough to travel across Europe. The forecast for 18 April at 06:00 showed a significant plume continuing over northern Europe. Jet stream forecasts indicated the ash cloud plume would persist until at least 21 April, shifting to the south and affecting more southerly parts of France and Italy.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) estimated that the airline industry worldwide would lose €148 million (US$200 million, £130 million) a day during the disruption.

Countries affected

Dust particles suspended in the atmosphere scatter light from the setting sun, generating 'volcanic lavenders' like this one over the flight path of Leeds-Bradford Airport in England during the aviation shutdown

The following countries had controlled airspace which were closed to Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) flights after the eruption: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Finland (including Åland islands), Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy (North of the country), Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, UK. Iceland's own airspace remained mostly unaffected until 22 April, when winds from the East caused the Keflavik airport to shut down.

Background

The London Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre (VAAC) was responsible for providing information about the ash plume to the relevant civil aviation authorities in the form of Volcanic Ash Advisories (VAA). On the basis of this, the authorities made decisions about when and where airspace should be closed due to the safety issues. Their decisions resulted in the cancellations of flights at airports across the world, not only in those countries where airspace was restricted. On 16 April 2010, 16,000 of Europe's usual 28,000 daily scheduled passenger flights were cancelled and on the 17 April, 16,000 of the usual 22,000 flights were cancelled.

By 21 April 95,000 flights had been cancelled.

Prior to this, the most severe restrictions to air travel in recent times were following the attacks of 11 September 2001 in the United States when all (not just scheduled) civil air traffic in US airspace, and to and from the United States, was grounded for three days. The Eyjafjallajökull eruption grounded most scheduled passenger air traffic with and within northern Europe from 15 April 2010, and there was no expectation of a return to normality before 21 April at the earliest.

Professor Bill McGuire of the Aon Benfield UCL Hazard Research Centre said on 15 April that the most notable eruption of the Icelandic volcano Laki which occurred in 1783, would, if it occurred today "have the potential to severely affect air travel at high northern latitudes for six months or more". The last time the Eyjafjallajökull volcano erupted in 1821, it spewed ash for over a year. Geophysicists in Iceland said that the production of ash from Eyjafjallajökull was likely to continue at a comparable level for some days or even weeks; a geophysicist at the Icelandic Meteorological Office said, "Where it disrupts travel depends on the weather. It depends how the wind carries the ash".

Attempts to reopen airspace

Ash plume blowing across the North Atlantic on 15 April.

There were brief windows free of the cloud at any given location which were exploited to make a few aircraft movements.

On 16 April a 30-minute break at Manchester allowed two flights to land, and one aircraft to be moved to Florida, empty (as there was no time for passengers to board). At Glasgow, an Air Transat flight to Toronto took off while a British Airways flight from New York, and a Thomas Cook flight from Orlando and Icelandair flights from Keflavik landed.

On 17 April 2010, the president of German airline Air Berlin, in an interview with the newspaper Bild am Sonntag, stated that the risks for flights due to this volcanic haze were nonexistent, because the assessment was based only on a computer simulation produced by the VAAC. He went on to claim that the Luftfahrt-Bundesamt closed German airspace without checking the accuracy of these simulations. Spokesmen for Lufthansa and KLM stated that during their test flights, required by the European Union, there were no problems with the aircraft. On the morning of 17 April Lufthansa moved 10 aircraft from Munich to Frankfurt at low altitude following visual flight rules. There were no problems reported and no sign of damage to the planes. The same day, an Airbus belonging to Ural Airlines attempted flying below the ash clouds from Moscow to Rimini. When the airplane was in Austrian airspace, the crew reported being low on fuel and diverted to Vienna, where the airplane landed safely.

On the morning of 18 April KLM successfully carried out a test flight from Amsterdam to Düsseldorf with no problems. Afterwards, seven KLM planes with no passengers returned from Düsseldorf to Amsterdam. Air France also performed a test flight from Paris to Toulouse. In the evening of 18 April German airspace was partially re-opened for a period of 3 hours allowing a plane of stranded holidaymakers from Faro, Portugal to land at Hanover.

The vice president of the Dutch pilots union said "We are asking the authorities to really have a good look at the situation, because 100 per cent safety does not exist," Mr Verhagen continued. "It's easy to close down air space because then it's perfectly safe, but at some time you have to resume flights."

In the afternoon of 19 April, German carriers Lufthansa and Air Berlin obtained permission for some flights from and to German airports under Visual Flight Rules. Lufthansa started sending planes to long-haul destination in order to return stranded passengers later that day.

Late on 19 April and early on 20 April, some flights were permitted to take off in northern Europe, including from Scotland and northern England, but Manchester Airport, that had planned to open on 20 April, remained closed because of a new ash cloud. The Civil Aviation Authority announced that all UK airports would be permitted to open from 2200 on 20 April. 26 BA long-haul flights were already in the air and requesting permission to land.

By 20-21 April several airlines confirmed that "air service will be resumed in stages" and started publishing lists of selected flights that were "most likely to be operated" within one single day. "Effective Thursday, 22 April, Lufthansa will resume normal flight operations and offer you the usual reliability", claimed the airline at 15:30 on 21 April.

Airspace restrictions

Under international regulations, all scheduled passenger flights operate under the instrument flight rules which requires clearance to be obtained from air traffic control. In the following countries no IFR clearances could be granted because the controlled airspace was closed to IFR traffic. At various times, some airspace was re-opened to IFR traffic, including scheduled passenger flights. Non IFR flights are largely unaffected.

The airspace of Iceland itself was hardly disrupted at all.

Within Europe

Country	Restrictions imposed
Austria	On 16 April 2010, Austro Control ceased air activities at airports in both Vienna and Linz; Salzburg and Innsbruck stopped flights at 18:00 UTC; and Graz and Klagenfurt followed at 21:00 UTC. At 00:30 on 18 April, all Austrian airports were closed until 18:00. The Austria Press Agency reports that permission to resume takeoffs and landings took effect at 5 a.m. local time (0300 GMT) Monday but says it is unclear if the airspace will remain open all day.
Belarus	On Saturday 17 April, the airspace over Belarus was closed.
Belgium	Belgium's airspace closed at 14:30 UTC on 15 April. It remained closed until 06:00 UTC on Tuesday 20 April.
Bosnia and Herzegovina	The airspace over Bosnia and Herzegovina was closed to traffic from 08:00  (06:00 UTC) until midnight (22:00 UTC) on 17 April.
Bulgaria	On Sunday 18 April, all Bulgarian airports were closed. However, at 14:00 local time the airports in Sofia and Plovdiv were open.
Croatia	At 02:00 CET on 17 April, the air space over northern Croatia was closed, including Zagreb. At 08:00 CET the airports at Pula, Rijeka, Zadar and Lošinj were closed.
Czech Republic	On 16 April Czech airspace was closed, after partial closure forced some aircraft to land at Brno. Czech airspace would remain closed at least until 12:00 on 19 April. During 16 April, approximately 400 flights to and from Prague were cancelled.
Denmark	Naviair, the state-owned company controlling Danish airspace, announced that Denmark's airspace would close at 16:00 UTC on 15 April. However, Naviair assessed that it is safe to fly through airspace in high altitude - 35,500 feet, the equivalent to almost 11 km. This means that aircraft such as Japan to New York can fly over Denmark. Danish airspace will be closed until 02:00 on 21 April.
Estonia	On 15 April Estonian Air flights from Tallinn to Oslo, Copenhagen and London were cancelled due to airspace closures in Norway, Denmark and the United Kingdom. As the ash cloud spread over Estonia on the night of 16 April, all flights were cancelled due to closure of airspace in Estonia. Estonian airspace were partly opened in the evening of 19 April and completely late evening on 20 April.
Finland	Finland closed its airspace at 00:00 UTC+03 on 16 April, having previously closed northern, western and central parts of its airspace. On 19 April a gap formed in the ash cloud over Finland, and Finavia lifted flight restrictions at the airports of Helsinki-Vantaa, Turku, and Tampere-Pirkkala in the afternoon. During the five hours that Helsinki-Vantaa airport was open, there were a total of ten flights either arriving or departing. On 20 April the upper airspace was opened in 9,5 kilometres altitude to international overflights above the occurrence of the ash. On 21 April, Helsinki-Vantaa Airport's air traffic control services are open and other airport services, like terminal services, are returning to normal by 12.00 noon. The airport was closed again at 3 pm. On 22 April, Helskinki Vantaa Airport was opened around 3 pm, and was expected to remain open at least 24 hours.
France	At 23:00 UTC+02 on 15 April, 24 airports, including Charles De Gaulle Airport were closed. On 17 April, the Direction Générale de l'Aviation Civile extended the suspension to 35 airports, including all Paris airports, until 08:00 UTC+2 on Monday 19 April. On 18 April, the closure of the Paris airports was extended to at least 08:00 UTC+2 on Tuesday 20 April.
Germany	On 16 April, all international airports in Germany were closed. The complete airspace is opened again for IFR and VFR since 9:00 UTC on 21 April.
Hungary	Hungary's airspace was closed at 17:00 UTC on 16 April. It remained closed until 10:00 UTC on Monday 19 April.
Iceland	On 22 April 2010, the Keflavik airport, which serves as the main entry point for International flights to Iceland, closed due to ash.
Ireland	On 15 April 2010, the Irish Aviation Authority announced restrictions on flying in Irish airspace until 06:00 UTC+01 on Friday 16 April at the earliest Restrictions were lifted on flights to and from Cork, Shannon and some regional airports by the day's end but restrictions remained at Dublin until 11:00 UTC+1. The government's emergency planning taskforce, which included several government departments, An Garda Síochána, Met Éireann, the Irish Aviation Authority and Dublin Airport Authority, met on the evening of 15 April to discuss the emergency. The taskforce had met at the National Emergency Co-ordinating Centre on five further occasions by the morning of 20 April 2010. On 16 April, Irish air space was reopened for domestic flights from 10:00 UTC+01 and westward transatlantic flights resumed from Dublin: Irish flights which were scheduled to fly eastwards over the United Kingdom and continental European airspace remained grounded. On 17 April, the ash spread to most of Ireland, and all airspace was closed until 18:00 UTC+01, and subsequently extended until 18:00 UTC+01 on Monday 19 April. On Monday 19 April, the country's aviation chief warned that Dublin was "damned" and would be shut off to the rest of the world until Friday 23 April. On Tuesday 20 April, it was reported that at least 30,000 Irish people were still stranded abroad, unable to get home. Those who were at home were opting for "staycations", as Irish holidaymakers swapped Barcelona for Ballybunion in a boost for domestic tourism. It had been anticipated that Irish air space would re-open for limited flights from 05:00 UTC+1 on 20 April 2010, however the volcanic ash cloud made this impossible. It was expected that normal flights will resume from Friday, 23 April 2010, due to the backlog of flights. Shannon Airport opened since 13:00UTC+1 on 20 April (not for departing commercial flights) but Cork Airport and Dublin Airport remained closed. On 20 April at 21:00 UTC+1 Irish airspace fully re-opened, but air travellers are still advised to contact their airline. It is expected that normal flights will resume on Friday, 23 April, 2010. A statement from the Irish Aviation Authority said "[it] is expected that flights tomorrow [21 April] will focus on positioning aircraft and crews and full service by the airlines may take up to three days to recover. Passengers should consult airline websites before travelling to the airport for flights."
Italy	Ente Nazionale per l'Aviazione Civile closed the airspace over Northern Italy for 17 April, excluding emergency flights and flights flying over 35,000 feet (11,000 m), from 06:00 UTC+02 until 14:00 UTC+02. The closure was later extended to 08:00 UTC+02 on Monday 19 April. Over 198 flights at the Rome airports were cancelled, 436 at the Milan airports, 104 at Naples and 43 at Catania.
Kosovo	Kosovo closed its airspace at 00:00 UTC+02 on 18 April, cutting air access to Pristina. It was to reopen at 14:00 UTC+02 on 18 April.
Latvia	Latvian airspace was closed at 21:00 UTC on 15 April, cutting air access to Riga and other airports of local significance. It is to remain closed until at least 06:00 UTC on 19 April, but would probably remain closed until 22 April.
Luxembourg	Luxembourg Airport was closed for virtually all flights on 16 April 2010 and remained closed at least until the evening of 18 April.
Netherlands	Dutch airspace closed at 17:00 UTC on 15 April and remained closed until 20:00 CEST on 19 April. They will restart flights after this time, starting with 3 KLM flights to Dubai, New York and Shanghai.
Norway	Passengers flocked to the Norwegian State Railways at Bergen Station while the airspace was closed. Air travel was suspended from 14 April. Airports throughout Nord-Trøndelag, Nordland, Troms and Finnmark were re-opened at times, as those areas were least affected by the ash: the largest of these, Trondheim, was opened for six hours on 16 April. However, it and the other four largest airports in Norway, Oslo, Bergen, Stavanger and Sandefjord, remained closed by 13:00 UTC on 17 April. The total closure of Norwegian airspace included the 21 search and rescue and medical aircraft and helicopters in the country. The health authorities stated that the challenges faced were unprecedented in modern history, and ambulances and medical personnel were moved north and out of cities to decentralise the service and replace the lost aerial transport. The air space caused most of the oil platforms in the North Sea to not be able to fly in new personnel, causing existing crews to have to work until 18 April.
Poland	Poland closed the northern part of its airspace at 18:00 UTC on 15 April. On 16 April its whole airspace was shut down. The disruption affected the funeral for the Polish president Lech Kaczyński, his wife Maria and the other victims who died in an air crash earlier in April 2010. Family members decided not to postpone the ceremony, resulting in other countries' dignitaries being unable to attend.
Portugal	Portugal's The Institute of Meteorology (IM) announced on Tuesday that the cloud of volcanic ash entered the Portuguese airspace controlled by the Azorean island of Santa Maria, in an area still far from the national territory, and the affected area "very small". For the most part, only flights to countries with closed airpsaces were cancelled forcing numerous members of the government (including the president) who were away to return to the country by car from the UK, Austria and Belgium. however several flights to the U.S. and elsewhere we also cancelled because of the unavailability of planes coming from other parts of Europe or carriers that required the planes to stop in their countries, such as Germany or France.
Romania	Romania closed the north western part of its airspace at 00:00 local time (UTC+03) on 17 April, including Oradea, Satu Mare, Baia Mare, Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, and Timişoara airports. The two Bucharest airports were also closed. Romania's entire airspace closed at 18:00 local time (UTC+03) on 17 April until at least 12:00 on 19 April. On 20 April Timisoara, Otopeni, Băneasa, Craiova, Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, Oradea, Satu Mare and Baia Mare airports reopened.
Serbia Montenegro Bosnia and Herzegovina	Air Traffic Services Agency of Serbia and Montenegro, shut down all traffic over Serbia, Montenegro, part of international waters of the Adriatic Sea, and the upper airspace of Bosnia and Herzegovina that it controls, at 14:00 UTC, 17 April. The airspace was reopened at 22:00 UTC, 18 April.
Slovakia	Slovakia's airspace was closed at 15:00 UTC on 16 April.
Slovenia	The Transport Ministry closed the airspace to the north of the 46th parallel up to 35,500 feet (10,800 m) at 22:00 UTC on 16 April, and over the entire country at 06:00 UTC on 17 April. The closure lasted until 19:10 UTC on 18 April. It was the first closure of Slovenian airspace since the Ten-Day War. Since 03:00 UTC on 20 April, the airspace has been closed again up to 20,500 ft (6,200 m).
Spain	Aena closed seven airports in northern Spain at 20:00 UTC+1 on 17 April: they were planned to remain closed until 10:00 on 18 April, but one hour later, at 21:00 UTC+1 they started to operate again. At 08:30 UTC+1 on 18 April 11 northern airports were closed, including Barcelona, the country's second largest. At 12:00 UTC+1 two more airports in the Balearic Islands were closed, including Spain's third largest Palma de Mallorca. All 13 airports were expected to reopen at 20:00 UTC+1 on 18 April. Other minor airports, not controlled by Aena, were closed as well, although it was thought they could be re-opened at 15:30 UTC+1.
Sweden	Sweden's airspace was closed at 20:00 UTC on 15 April. Airspace north of Söderhamn was reopened at 16:45 CEST on 18 April.
Switzerland	The Federal Office of Civil Aviation issued a notice to airmen at 14:15 UTC on 16 April stating that the FIR Switzerland would be closed for visual and instrument flight rules operations from 21:59 UTC on 16 April to 12:00 UTC on 19 April. Police, Search and Rescue (SAR) and emergency medical helicopter flights were exempted. Swiss International Air Lines informed its customers on 16 April that the airports at Zurich, Basel, Geneva and Lugano airports would be closed, and that all flights going to those airports would be cancelled. Some minor airports, such as Ambri, were closed.
Turkey	The Directorate General of Civil Aviation closed central-northern national air zones by 13:30 UTC (16:30 UTC+3) on 18 April between flight levels FL200 and FL350 until 09:00 UTC (12:00 UTC+3) on 19 April. All airports, however, remain open.
Ukraine	The Ministry of Transport closed most national air zones by 00:00 UTC+3 on 17 April: only southern airports remained open. Aircraft from Egypt and Thailand, bound for Kiev, landed at Simferopol. All Ukrainian airspace was closed by 15:00 EEST on 17 April.
United Kingdom	Numerous grounded planes at Edinburgh Airport on 15 April. Arrivals board in Heathrow's Terminal 5 on 16 April. Scotland was the third region in Europe, after Iceland and Norway, to be affected, with all Scottish airports being closed to instrument flight rules (IFR) operations by 04:00 BST on 15 April. The United Kingdom's controlled airspace was closed to IFR flights at 11:00 UTC (12:00 BST) on 15 April. Plans to lift air traffic control restrictions from 19:00 BST on Friday 16 April over a large part of Scottish airspace, including Scottish airports, Shetland, Orkney and Northern Ireland, were revoked due to deteriorating conditions. However, several Icelandair planes flying from Keflavik landed at Glasgow on 16 April. Later on Saturday 17 April, it was suggested that a few domestic flights would be able to take off from Scotland and Northern Ireland before 19:00 BST (18:00 UTC) on Saturday, although most aircraft would remain grounded. The restrictions on flights in British airspace were subsequently extended. The last announcement (21 April) on the opening of most of UK airspace can be found by following this link. NATS Statement on Icelandic Volcanic Eruption There have been no restriction on visual flight rules traffic. Royal Air Force search and rescue aircraft continued to operate as normal, as did flights between Land's End and the Isles of Scilly which operate in uncontrolled airspace at an altitude less than 3,000 feet (910 m). On 17 April it was reported that low levels of ash from the volcano had fallen across parts of Scotland, northern England, the English Midlands and the Thames Valley. The UK Health Protection Agency and the World Health Organisation recommended that people who witnessed any falling ash should stay indoors to prevent possible health problems. The last commercial flight to leave British airspace before the lockdown was imposed was a Singapore Airlines flight (number SQ317) from London Heathrow airport to Singapore Changi airport. It was officially scheduled to leave at 1155hrs BST but became airborne in reality at 1132hrs BST because of an early startup. It qualifies for last flight to leave because of the flight plan filed. There remained no commercial airliners in British airspace until the morning of 16 April, when an Air Transat flight was given clearance to leave Glasgow for Toronto. On the evening of 20 April, it was announced that all the UK's airports would be opened from 22:00.

Outside Europe

One country outside Europe had flights cancelled due to the risk of the ash cloud reaching its territory.

Country

Restrictions imposed

Canada

Several flights scheduled to leave St. John's International Airport in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador on Monday, 19 April before 9:00 a.m., were cancelled after a forecast by Transport Canada and Nav Canada gave warning of a 30% risk of volcanic ash reaching St. John's. Inbound and outbound flights were also cancelled in Gander and Deer Lake. However, most cancellations and delays at St. John's were the result of heavy fog on that day. Only one flight cancellation, from Porter Airlines, seems to be related to the volcanic ash warning , while Air Canada said their flights were "subject to some delays due to inclement weather, unrelated to ash cloud." and WestJet cancelled a flight because of a maintenance problem. On Tuesday, 20 April, it was reported that two Air Canada Jazz flights between the Magdalen Islands and Quebec City cancelled stop-offs in Gaspé because of ashes over the Gaspé Airport. Although the UK Met Office map of 21 April shows the ash cloud reaching Labrador, Newfoundland, the Maritime provinces, far eastern Quebec, and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, concentrations are expected to be sparse and no Canadian airspace has been closed or restricted because of volcanic ash.

Stranded travellers

Five million travellers were stranded or unable to fly. The Association of British Travel Agents estimates there could be as many as a million British people stranded abroad. Disruption was said to be greater than that after the 11 September attacks.

• Several thousand passengers were stranded in Asia. Thousands of Europe-bound passengers from Asia, the United States and Australia have been left stranded.
• Inside Brussels airport, 200 travellers from Bangladesh were trapped, unable to leave the building without a visa.
• Passengers from Kolkata headed for London on an Air India flight were diverted to Frankfurt, where they were unable to leave the airport to access hotels, because they did not have visas for Germany.
• A group of passengers from the United Kingdom were facing arrest in Delhi over a breach of immigration laws, because they left the airport without visas.
• Belarus, Serbia, Finland and Russia eased visa formalities for affected passengers.
• The disruption was expected to have a significant effect on schools across the United Kingdom: the eruption came at the end of the Easter Holidays and many pupils and teachers were among those stranded abroad.

Many air passengers to and from the closed area in Europe are being flown to or from Madrid Airport in Spain (outside the closed area) and transported overland.

The UK Border Agency announced on 17 April 2010 that it "would like to reassure travellers who have been unable to leave the UK and whose visas have now expired. We appreciate that this is due to exceptional circumstances beyond your control." Travellers in this situation were advised to retain evidence of travel reservations that but for the travel disruption would have allowed them to leave the United Kingdom before their visas expired.

Travel conditions in France were compounded by an ongoing rail strike affecting long-distance trains.

Swedish and Norwegian media reports that charter tourists visiting Mallorca, Canary Islands, Cyprus or Egypt could on their home journey be flown only to Barcelona or Athens, from where they had to get home by bus. The road distance Athens-Oslo is ≈3400 km, needing ≈2.5 days if going day and night.

Alternative transport routes

Passengers destined for countries where airspace was closed had some alternatives available. Portugal and Morocco were still open and in the east, Turkey was available. There was a switch to other modes of transport:

• Within Europe, many people tried to reach their destination by train or bus. Vehicles (coaches, hire cars, etc) arrived at Calais with registration plates from all over Europe. Train companies reported a remarkable increase in passenger numbers, and despite adding services, suggest that prospective passengers should make reservations beforehand.
• Some people took taxicabs for long distances, such as John Cleese, who took a taxi from Oslo to Brussels. A woman stranded in Faro, Portugal bought a second-hand car and drove home to Britain, a journey of 1400 miles.
• Most UK and Irish ferry routes were exceptionally busy.
• Eurostar passenger trains were solidly booked, and the Eurotunnel car-carrying trains which run through the Channel Tunnel were very busy, and extra trains were scheduled to run while the disruption of air travel continued.
• Irish coach operator Bus Éireann arranged extra Eurolines services between Ireland and England via ferry.
• Some people turned to Twitter and Facebook, as well as to other sites like Roadsharing, in an effort to arrange alternative travel plans involving boats, trains and other forms of transportation, like cars, as well as to try and find rooms for the night in the cities where they were stuck.

On 18 April British Ministers announced a plan for flights to land and take off in Spain, and to transport passengers by sea to the United Kingdom. On 19 April the cabinet crisis response committee (COBRA) decided that the Royal Navy should be utilised to aid the repatriation of stranded British travellers, in Operation Cunningham. The ships HMS Ark Royal, HMS Ocean and HMS Albion were deployed, but only Albion was directly involved in the repatriation effort.

As an alternative to face to face business meetings, videoconferencing was also used by the European Union, governments and companies.

Military flying

On 15 April, five Finnish Air Force F-18 fighter jets on exercise flew into the ash cloud in northern Finland. Volcanic dust was found on the engines of three of the aircraft and a further inspection revealed extensive damage by molten glass deposits inside the combustion chamber of one of the engines. The engines were sent for disassembly and overhaul. As a result all unnecessary military flights were cancelled except for identification flights to enforce sovereign airspace. Meanwhile a BAE Hawk trainer with special equipment to sample the volcanic dust was being flown from the 41st squadron in Kauhava. Even short test flights with an F-18 revealed engine damage sufficient to destroy engines.

On 19 April, NATO reported finding molten glass in the engines of at least one F-16, the result of flying through the ash cloud, leading to the scaling-down of U.S. military exercises. Royal Air Force flights to Selly Oak Hospital in Birmingham were grounded, and the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence considered flying British casualties of the Afghan War to coalition countries.

Impacts of the disruption

Main article: Aftermath of the 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption

The ash indirectly affected many scheduled cultural and sporting events because key participants were unable to attend due to disrupted travel plans. There was also a wider impact on the economies of several countries.

One of the significant events disrupted was the funeral of Polish president Lech Kaczyński in Kraków on Sunday, 18 April 2010, which was to have been attended by 69 presidents, prime ministers, and other heads of states. Almost half of these, including The Prince of Wales, Barack Obama, Angela Merkel, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Stephen Harper and Nicolas Sarkozy were unable to travel to Poland because of the disrupted air traffic.

See also

• British Airways Flight 9 - 1982, volcanic dust disrupted flight
• KLM Flight 867 - 1989, volcanic dust disrupted flight
• Eruption column

External links

• "Live: Volcanic cloud over Europe" updates on BBC News
• "The eruption that changed Iceland forever" - BBC News Magazine (Laki eruption - 1783)
• "A glance at flight disruptions due to volcanic ash" The Associated Press, 19 April 2010
• "Tracking the Cancellations" The New York Times, 15 April 2010, updated 20 April 2010
• SIGMET Europe