That Volcano in Iceland

To me, this is just incredible:

Europe extends flight bans as ash cloud spreads
AFP - 2 hours 34 minutes ago

LONDON (AFP) - – Millions of people faced worsening travel chaos Saturday as a volcanic ash cloud from Iceland moved further south and east, forcing European countries to extend flight bans into next week.

France decided to shut the three airports in the Paris area and others in the north of the country until 8:00 am (0600 GMT) on Monday due to the ash cloud that has caused the biggest airspace shutdown since World War II.

Italy also said it would not allow any flights until 0600 GMT Monday, Ireland shut its airspace until 1200 GMT Sunday and Britain and Germany lengthened bans on most flights in their airspace until 0600 GMT Sunday.

Additionally, British Airways cancelled all its flights due to have arrived in and depart London on Sunday.

Winds blowing the massive cloud eastward from Iceland to Russia will continue in the same direction for at least two days and could go on until the middle of next week, the Icelandic Meteorological Office said on Saturday.

"The ash will continue to be directed towards Britain and Scandinavia," Teitur Arason, a meteorologist at the Icelandic Meteorological Office, told AFP.

"That's the general situation for the coming days ... more or less for the next two days or maybe the next four or five days," he said.

The volcanic ash cloud is heading towards Greece as it moves further south as well as east into Russia, Britain's meteorological group the Met Office said on Saturday.

Full Article

You can see the current flight situation over Europe by clicking here. That map only covers European flights (not global flights which is why you only see a few over other areas of the world), and is usually chocked full of little yellow airplane symbols.

Meanwhile, you have the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, spending thus far more than 36 hours trying to get from San Francisco to Berlin (most of that time spent in southern Europe), and you're having tens of thousands of flights canceled. They're even talking about the possibility of this going off and on for a couple years.

Some pictures:

It's just unbelievable. And I really hope it won't last long...

It's incredible. I hope they figure out something soon or that it stops.

What's kind of funny is that you can still fly in and out of Reykjavik Airport, which is only a two-hour drive from the volcano, but you can't fly in and out of Paris, Berlin, London, Milan, or Helsinki due to the direction of the winds.

Nature's funny that way huh?

The cause of the eruption.

No, seriously, this stuff is crazy. Bring all your pets inside and don't go out if you don't have to. Stay indoors. The stuff you would be breathing in is glass, which is basically poisonous to your system.

And yeah. Let's hope this eruption doesn't start another eruption of an even more explosive volcano. My geology professor said that they were hoping it didn't come to that, but... well... the last three times they recorded this happening, the other, more explosive volcano ended up erupting.

Fingers crossed!

What's even more bizarre is that where I live, the weather is really amazing. The sun is blazing and there are no clouds in the sky whatsoever. The fact that I live in the UK is even weirder! It's creepy to think that there's a giant cloud of ash coming when the sky is so clear...

Bring all your pets inside and don't go out if you don't have to. Stay indoors. The stuff you would be breathing in is glass, which is basically poisonous to your system.

It's not that dangerous. If or when the cloud comes, you should stay indoors. According to the news reports here in Britain, it's only dangerous if you have asthma, chest problems or anything like that. This has happened before and no one has ever been seriously effected by it.

We've been pretty much spared apart from the far south of the country. My dad's having to drive to Belgium rather than fly though- he's badly asthmatic, so fingers crossed it's not too bad in England at the moment.

That said, I'm enjoying the hype. I was at a barbecue last night and I agree with Skins, the weather is glorious at the moment. But every half hour I managed to get "volcanic ash" into the conversation somewhere.

I want to know if you can actually see it in the badly affected countries...?

You can see it pretty well in Iceland!

My dad was telling me about an F-18 (I think it was Swedish) that flew a practice run a couple days ago. The pilot didn't see any volcanic ash the entire time he was up, but within an hour, the intake manifolds were clogged with it. Since the intakes were clogged, the engine started heating up and he was forced to land. Inside, the ash had congealed into more of a glass-like substance, and that happened with only one hour in the air.

Ow. That's interesting yet sad, if you get my drift.

Anyway, according to the papers here, there are about 5,000 Europeans/people bound for Europe stranded in the airports because of the ash and they're complaining that the airline authorities aren't compensating well enough for the delays caused.

Skins wrote:What's even more bizarre is that where I live, the weather is really amazing. The sun is blazing and there are no clouds in the sky whatsoever. The fact that I live in the UK is even weirder! It's creepy to think that there's a giant cloud of ash coming when the sky is so clear...

Bring all your pets inside and don't go out if you don't have to. Stay indoors. The stuff you would be breathing in is glass, which is basically poisonous to your system.

It's not that dangerous. If or when the cloud comes, you should stay indoors. According to the news reports here in Britain, it's only dangerous if you have asthma, chest problems or anything like that. This has happened before and no one has ever been seriously effected by it.

Yeah the weather here in the UK is beautiful! Proper ice-cream weather although I can't eat the stuff because of my new brace I'm flying to Spain soon with my school so I'm hoping the ash will have cleared by then!

The frustrating thing is that the people stranded have no one to blame. On the news there are people saying, 'this shouldn't be happening, it's an outrage' but it's nature. I feel sorry for all the people stranded all over the world from their easter holiday's with no money left.

P.S. I hope you get back from Turkey soon, Megan!

I live in Edinburgh, and work in a hotel - oh the joys I've had over the last couple of weeks! - so when I got to work early on that Thursday and the guys at concierge told us that a volcano had exploded and closed the airports, we were like, "What the????"
While the weather was crisp and perfectly sunny for four of the six days in Edinburgh, I totally agree with the decision to close airports. My Mum, back home in Australia, thought that ash was actually falling out of the sky. That was my first reaction as well, to look outside.

But as I said, I agree. Sure, billions have been lost, but it's money we are talking about here, not lives. And surely to make sure that no lives were lost (yes, you might say that's a little drastic), that's a price we have to pay for Mother Nature getting one up on us? I'd rather have millions stranded around the world then bodies strewn across the ocean because some of the ash got into the planes. And although they tested 50 flights - think of how many flights leave Heathrow, Gatwick, etc each day. Hundreds. Who's not to say that one flight could be affected?

Guh. It's decided to keep affecting us, our airports are being closed again and again. The Sixth Years from my school are being told to cancel our flights for the June Bank Holiday since they have exams the week after and there's a huge chance the Irish airports are going to be shut. Having escaped it at first, us and bits of Scotland are basically the only ones now being affected it seems, because we're so close to Iceland.

*moans*

Hey, there's another ash cloud of media death on the way! The Ash cloud cometh! The thing is, they are letting aircraft fly this time through denser ash. There will be accidents, mark my words well...

Ah, don't talk that way.