News Icelandic volcano eruption threatens flights across Europe

[Urwumpe]

A german satire page already made puns about "Icelandic ash coming to Germany" (with "Ash"/"Asche" being a slang term for money in German)

 

[cjp]

The sunset looked quite normal to me. I made some pictures, and I'll upload them as soon as I can.

 

[Notebook]

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/index.html

 

[Urwumpe]

The sunset looked quite normal to me. I made some pictures, and I'll upload them as soon as I can.

I had a light greenish fog in the skies above during sunset. Not very intense yet, but not the usual colors.

 

[astrosammy]

My view to the west is blocked, I hope that the sunrise is cloud-free and that some ash is still in the air.

 

[cjp]

The complete set of pictures is in the zip file. To make it easier for you, I've also attached one of the pictures directly.

I think the pictures give quite a good impression of how the colors really looked. At least the similarity is good on my monitor.

 

[Sky Captain]

Some nice pictures of Iceland`s volcano eruption.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/icelands_disruptive_volcano.html

---------- Post added at 09:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:17 AM ----------

A cool site showing locations of most aircraft realtime and how eruption has affected air travel. The whole northern and western Europe airspace are empty of planes

http://www.flightradar24.com/

 

[Ghostrider]

Just in, the EU commission is writing a strong letter to the volcano.

 

[Notebook]

Its quite strange sitting here about 10 miles from Heathrow. Normally I can see three or four aircraft out the window, depending on the active runways.

Its quiet, and no contrails in the sky. Modern jets aren't noisy, but you do notice the difference.

Picked a bad time to buy some flight tracking software...
http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k207/Notebook_04/AshFriday.jpg

N.

 

[SiberianTiger]

Picked a bad time to buy some flight tracking software...
http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k207/Notebook_04/AshFriday.jpg

N.

I've stumbled upon an information that this volcano erupted the last time in 1821 and the eruption lasted for 2 years. Rule, Britannia, rule the waves!

 

[Notebook]

Long time since Britannia ruled anything, especially this one!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Britannia

Its getting spooky here, no aircraft noise at all, not even the odd helicopter.

Edit:
Looking at the animation in #23 again, it looks like the ash was aimed at Denmark?

 

[SiberianTiger]

Long time since Britannia ruled anything, especially this one!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Britannia

I mean, it's a time again for good ole' steamers!

 

[Urwumpe]

Propeller planes shouldn't be affected. They don't suck the air in, the blow it away.

Ah yes...and now, the 500 Euro question: How do the propeller planes turn their propeller?

A The first class passengers have to move some pedals
B Magic
C With a combustion engine.
D Love

 

[SiberianTiger]

Ah yes...and now, the 500 Euro question: How do the propeller planes turn their propeller?

It looks like the only thing to fly today in the affected area is ...

 

[Urwumpe]

It looks like the only thing to fly today in the affected area is ...

I actually meant the absurd claim, that propellers blow air away instead of sucking it in. That is a huge lack of knowledge about how propeller engines work and especially how jet engines work (if jet engines just suck air in, shouldn't the planes inflate?)

The ash cloud is currently also not lower than 6000ft, from what I have heard. The C-54 Skymaster that does memorial tours for the Berlin airlift was also flying over my town today, at least according to my ears.

Also propeller planes, especially turboprops (which have the same internals as a jet engine) are not immune to ash. During WW2, operating propeller planes in the desert was already a pain in the ass, without sand filters - and modern planes have no filters at all. And ash is worse than sand, sand doesn't melt inside the combustion chambers and is not as hard as the ash particles, it just passes the engine with a lot of erosion, but doesn't damage the engines as fast as ash can.

 

[garyw]

The only aircraft I've seen operating in London is a police helicopter. I know that both the Police and the Air Ambulance people have gotten permission to fly as required but then their flights are typically on the order of 10's of minutes and at much lower altitudes.

 

[Urwumpe]

Do I look like I know about planes?

I don't care how you look. I say that you have not even basic knowledge about engine operations. How your look relates to what you have inside your brain or your skills, is not at all understandable to me, maybe you want to explain it to me.

I look like Jesus with a bad hang-over, but my skills are limited to swim and turn grapes into whine.

 

[SiberianTiger]

I actually meant the absurd claim, that propellers blow air away instead of sucking it in. That is a huge lack of knowledge about how propeller engines work and especially how jet engines work (if jet engines just suck air in, shouldn't the planes inflate?)

I see, I simply thought that the only type of combustion engine immune to this sort of contamination is a rocket one. Too bad all those trans-continental rocket plane projects haven't seen a light!

 

[cjp]

Ah yes...and now, the 500 Euro question: How do the propeller planes turn their propeller?

A The first class passengers have to move some pedals
B Magic
C With a combustion engine.
D Love

C.
How will you send me the 500 Euro?

 

[Urwumpe]

C.
How will you send me the 500 Euro?

Since planes don't fly, continental drift. :lol: