Iceland Volcano Eruption Forces Cancellation of 77% of Europe Flights, Possibly Until April 22; Fascinating images
by ilene - April 18th, 2010 2:08 pm
Iceland Volcano Eruption Forces Cancellation of 77% of Europe Flights, Possibly Until April 22; Fascinating images
Courtesy of Mish
From Dublin to Moscow air traffic in Europe grinds to a halt as Volcano May Keep Europe Airports Shut Four More Days.
Northern and central Europe may remain closed to air traffic until April 22 as winds push ash from volcanic eruptions in Iceland across the continent, forecasters said.
European airlines canceled more than 77 percent of their flights yesterday as airports from Dublin to Moscow closed. No planes will operate out of the U.K. until at least 7 p.m. London time today, the National Air Traffic Service said. German airports will remain closed until 2 p.m. Berlin time, the DFS air traffic control agency said.
“Expect ongoing interruptions for the next four or five days,” Teitur Atlason, at the Icelandic meteorological office, said in a telephone interview yesterday. “The eruption is still in full swing, and the volcano is spewing pretty dark ashes as high into the air as 5 to 6 kilometers.”
“The jet stream winds, which extend from 10,000 feet up to 40,000 feet, show no signs of change through Wednesday,” Accuweather.com Inc. said in a statement. “Any ash plume that is released from the volcano will continue to threaten northern Europe and the British isles.”
Flights have been halted because of concerns that the ash plume could damage engines and speed sensors. The finest material from the blast is formed of dust akin to glass, which can melt and congeal in a turbine, causing it to stop, said Sue Loughlin, head of vulcanology at the British Geological Survey.
Volcanic eruptions may continue for months and curtail European air traffic, said Sigrun Hreinsdottir, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik. “It could erupt, pause for a few weeks, and then possibly erupt again,” he said.
The last eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in December 1821 continued until January 1823. The current blast has sent ash to as high as 7 kilometers (4.5 miles), according to Gudrun Larsen, a vulcanologist at the University of Iceland. The magma had to pierce 200 meters of ice before reaching the air, she said.
“The problem here is we have magma interacting with glacier ice, and that leads to explosions,” Hreinsdottir said. “That causes the material to go much higher in the air.”
Volcano Images
Image courtesy…
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