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Millions lost as volcanic cloud halts travel

Business leaders were last night counting the multi-million pound cost of Iceland's volcanic eruption as Westcountry airports prepared for a third day of shutdowns.

Aviation authorities said all flights in and out of the UK would remain grounded until at least 7am today as the cloud of volcanic ash continued to cover much of the UK.

It meant every flight out of Plymouth Airport run by Air Southwest and almost every scheduled Flybe and charter service at Exeter was cancelled yesterday.

At Newquay Airport, all air links save for the low-flying Isles of Scilly Skybus, which is not in controlled airspace, was grounded. In total, 70 departures and arrivals were cancelled at the region's three main airports.

For the second day running, the six-strong Skybus fleet continued to ferry passengers between the islands and the mainland, with services to Land's End, Newquay, Exeter, Bristol and Southampton running as normal.

The Devon and Cornwall Business Council estimated the disruption has already cost the two counties around £5 million, caused by the knock-on effect to hotels, restaurants, taxis and other travel-related enterprises.

Meanwhile, air traffic control company Nats' latest no-fly decision caused a major headache for airlines.

Exeter-based Flybe, whose fleet fly out of 38 UK airports, promised to put on extra flights as it scrambled to repatriate passengers marooned on the continent.

Jim French, chairman and chief executive of Flybe, which carries about 30,000 passengers a day, said the company was coping because most of its flights are domestic, but that it had passengers in Faro, Portugal, waiting to get home.

He said: "What we are hoping is that there is an improvement in the situation over the weekend. We have additional capacity lined up ready to try and bring those people (in Portugal) home."

But Iain Ballantyne's philosophical attitude turned to frustration yesterdaywhen he and his wife Lindsey were told the first flight they could secure was next Thursday – a week after they were due to leave Portugal.

"We were basically told at the airport that it was next Thursday or nothing," Mr Ballantyne, the Plymouth-based editor of Warships International Fleet Review, said. "My wife, who is a teacher and is due at school on Monday, looked like she was going to faint.

"There was no offer of any overnight accommodation, we have been left on our own. It is a pretty poor advert for Flybe and Exeter airport."

Mr Ballantyne, 46, has booked back into the Praia Sol Hotel in Vilamoura, on the Algarve. The couple are weighing up the time and financial implications of trying to get home via the ferry from Santander, northern Spain.

The carrier has said it is trying to re-book passengers on flights on the same route within the next 14 days.

Mr French went on that larger long-haul airlines were facing a "nightmare scenario", but since Flybe planes were not even taking off the company was not losing out too much financially as they were saving money on fuel.

While the Devon and Cornwall Police and Devon Air Ambulance helicopters based at Middlemoor, Exeter, continued to fly, Cornwall Air Ambulance said it grounded its helicopter as a precaution on the instructions of its operator.

source: thisiswesternmorningnews.co.uk

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