Few could have guessed the impact of eruptions from a volcano 1,000 miles away under the Eyjafjallajoekull glacier in Iceland. Last Wednesday, we found out. At mid-morning, the high-level cloud of volcanic ash had spread across the Atlantic and was approaching Scotland. Flight operations in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow were suspended. By midday the whole of British airspace was closed down. It has remained so ever since. Danger: Smoke and ash billow from a volcano in Eyjafjallajokul. The ash reaches up to 35,00ft At first it was all rather thrilling. Suddenly, city-dwellers looked up to clear quiet skies, without a vapour trail or a glint of sun hitting metal in sight. But now hours have turned into days and, though few are willing to admit it, days could just as easily turn into weeks… or perhaps longer. Thousands of flights have been cancelled, hundreds of thousands of passengers stranded and frustrated. The cost to airlines climbs through the millions of pounds with each passing moment. Tune into the latest updates on-line or on television and there is an inescapable doomsday feel to it all, with graphics of a shadowy mass spreading across the outline of our island. It is something we have, for the most part, simply accepted. After all, this isn’t some work and conditions dispute that can be argued out is it? We just have to sit it out don’t we? Anyone in any doubt of the wisdom or necessity of this nationwide grounding is promptly reminded of what happened to BA Flight 009. That was the jumbo jet en route from Kuala Lumpur to Perth on June 24, 1982, flying at 37,000ft when it suddenly experienced the nightmare scenario of all four engines failing. Pilot Captain Eric Moody glided the jet down more than 20,000ft before he successfully managed to restart one engine at 13,000ft followed by others, before landing safely. The aircraft had flown into a cloud of volcanic ash from the eruption of Mt Galunggung in Indonesia. There are other incidents too that can be cited. On December 15, 1989, a KLM jumbo lost all four engines when it flew into a cloud that turned out to be volcanic ash while descending to Anchorage, Alaska. The engines resumed working and the aircraft landed safely, but badly damaged. In 1991, Mt Pinatubo in the Philippines erupted, and more than 20 ‘volcanic ash encounters’ occurred from what was then the largest volcanic eruption of the past 50 years. The ability to predict where ash was to be found was challenging because of the enormous extent of the ash cloud. Commercial flights and various military operations were affected. One US operator grounded its aircraft in Manila for several days. Six years later, when Mt Popocatepetl in Mexico blew, there were several incidents. Although damage was minor in most cases, one flight crew experienced significantly reduced visibility for landing and had to look through the flight deck side windows to taxi after landing. In addition, the airport in Mexico City was closed for up to 24 hours on several occasions during subsequent intermittent eruptions. Each of these incidents was distinct and separate. And the action taken in response was distinct and separate. But that is where a gap begins to emerge between this history marshalled as reason for the current blanket grounding and the situation in which we find ourselves today. It was these incidents that had the international aviation community look at procedures and guidelines in the event of volcanic eruption. One very sensible outcome was to increase observations and reporting. The Galunggung incident had happened simply because no one had warned Captain Moody of the erupting volcano. Had he known about it, he could easily have changed course and avoided it. Over the past few days we have been led to believe that grounding all planes is inevitable. That there is absolutely no alternative. But that just isn’t true. Europe at a stand-still: Smoke and lava are seen as a volcano erupts in Eyjafjallajokul. Activity could continue for days or even months to come What we are witnessing here is not a natural law, enshrined since time immemorial but a policy drawn up by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) and then interpreted and enforced by the UK’s National Air Traffic Service (NATS). And that interpretation requires some scrutiny. In September 2009 the ICAO published their ‘Contingency plan for handling traffic in the event of volcanic ash penetrating the airspace of North Atlantic Region’. In many respects the guidelines are highly detailed though they make no distinction at all between major or relatively modest eruptions. Nor do they take into account the dilution effect as the cloud spreads from the original point. The only reference is to generic dust clouds, without any attempt to carry out a risk assessment. Using as its model the largest and most dangerous of Icelandic volcanoes, the Katla volcano, it offered a series of procedures for monitoring and tracking volcano ash clouds and ‘advice’ to be given to airlines in the event of a volcano eruption. This current eruption is a relatively modest affair – certainly not at all in the league of Katla. Yet it is worth noting that for even the most serious of foreseen eruptions the plan issued by the IOCA involved re-routing aircraft round, or under, dust plumes. The control tower at Edinburgh Airport as restrictions on flights in and out of the UK remain in place We have been scared into believing that to fly would be madness, but part of the rationale that is keeping us grounded is an economic equation rather than simple personal safety. To fly beneath the cloud until clear of it would mean burning more fuel. But not flying at all is surely burning money more swiftly. Low-flying to simply avoid the danger of ash being sucked into the jet engines is a temporary solution gaining currency on professional pilot’s forum Pprune. One pilot writing there yesterday pointed out: ‘The chances of it even appearing at puddle jumper altitudes is negligible’. It isn’t just daredevil pilots who are beginning to question the necessity of the current stalemate. Steve Wood, Chief Pilot at Sussex and Surrey Air Ambulance, yesterday described the measures being taken as ‘a complete overreaction’. Modern jet aircraft engines are amazingly robust. And indeed they must be so. They have to face not only the hazards of bird strikes, but rain, hail and even salt spray on take-off from coastal airports. All of which can potentially wreak havoc on engines. Furthermore, sand is a common hazard from dust storms and from desert airfields. Some aircraft are better equipped than others to deal with high-dust conditions, and consultation with aircraft and engine manufacturers might have enabled more precise restrictions to be imposed, rather than a blanket ban. But a spokesman for NATS admitted: ‘We don’t really deal with particular manufacturers.’ They were more concerned with ‘applying the international regulations’ rather than working on a specific plane-by-plane, make-by-make basis. The blanket ban under clear blue skies and glorious sunshine is making some wonder whether this ‘one-size-fits-all’ regulation is appropriate to a situation that the regulations did not foresee. And there will be many among the 200,000 Britons currently stranded abroad, who would be quite happy to take the risk. In the final analysis, despite the scares, no one has actually been killed in a volcano incident – something which cannot be said for the much more hazardous drive to the airport. Richard North is co-author of Scared To Death – From BSE To Global Warming: Why Scares Are Costing Us The Earth.As the cloud thickens, some pilots are asking...
Why can't we just fly beneath it?
Monday, 19 April 2010
19th April 2010
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