An ash cloud from Iceland’s spewing volcano halted air traffic across a wide swath of Europe on Thursday, grounding planes on a scale unseen since the 2001 terror attacks as authorities stopped all flights over Britain, Ireland and the Nordic countries. This event has caused absolute havoc with thousands of flights being cancelled and passengers stranded in airports all over Europe. At the moment here in Mallorca we have no sign of this ash cloud although it has been reported that it is on its way.
The ash plume, which rose to between 20,000 feet and 36,000 feet (6,000 meters and 11,000 meters), is apparently sitting above the Atlantic Ocean very close to the flight paths for the majority of routes from the U.S. east coast to Europe.
Unfortunately with the cloud drifting south and east across Britain, it was necessary for the country’s air traffic service to ban all non-emergency flights until at least 7 a.m. (0600GMT, 2 a.m. EDT) Friday. Irish authorities also closed their air space for at least eight hours, and aviation authorities in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Belgium took similar precautions.
Here in Mallorca, almost at the start of the tourist season we are hopeful that this ash cloud will disperse naturally before coming down as far as the Mediterranean.
