Iceland Volcano, Ash Crisis.

[TeeKup]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/04/19/volcano.ash/index.html?hpt=T2
http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/04/19/volcano.flight.rules/index.html

London, England (CNN) -- The UK is sending Royal Navy vessels to bring home travelers stranded by the ash cloud disruption, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Monday.

The HMS Ark Royal and HMS Ocean were making their way back to British waters, while the Defense Ministry worked to pinpoint locations that most need help.

Transport across Europe has been crippled since the eruption beneath southern Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull glacier worsened last week, prompting local evacuations and shutting European airspace.

With planes languishing at airports, stranded travelers have crammed onto boats and trains and rented cars to reach their destinations.

"I believe this is one of the most serious transport disruptions we have faced," Brown said. "It's got financial consequences as well as human consequences and we will do everything in our power to make sure all the arrangements are in place to help people, where possible, to get back home."

I just saw this one the news and thought I'd make a thread. Apparently a volcano in Iceland is doing its thing and it's massive ash cloud has spread across the rest of the EU, causing massive transportation issues. Airlines are losing roughly 200 million a day because of this. Several say they've ran test flights and say there is no harm but scientist say its still dangerous. Several EU fighter pilots report recovering glass like shards from their engines as well.

Kudos to the UK for doing their part.

[paladin]

Couple days old, but still :ohdear:

[Jean-Luc]

Several say they've ran test flights and say there is no harm but scientist say its still dangerous. Several EU fighter pilots report recovering glass like shards from their engines as well.

It's still damn risky. When ash passes through a plane's engine, the heat melts the material and it re-solidifies as glass when it hits the casing. There have been many cases of planes attempting to fly through an ash cloud and having all their engines shut down until they descend below the cloud and attempt to restart them.

[Limited]

Whole country has been FREAKING out about this, its insane how its crippled our transport so badly.

One football team is having to spend 24 hours driving a coach, to make it to Italy to play in the Champions League, which will suck because most fans cant get there to watch it.

We have slight amounts of ash on our cars, nothing visible in the air though. But yeah, closing the most busiest airport in the world for days has caused havoc.

Scientists are worried the volcano right next to the one erupting will also go up, history shows every time one goes the other one also does, problem is it has a massive glacier on top which will melt and cause bad flooding.

Its also showing no sight of stopping, which is bad.

[Dwood]

Quick, someone grab some cement and cap it! best of luck to ya mate.

[ICEE]

odd, I just read an interesting article. Related maybe? (http://www.fastcompany.com/1617231/icelandic-chefs-use-hot-lava-to-cook-bjork-chops?1271425351) interesting nonetheless. On another note, sucks to be UK right now.

[Warsaw]

most busiest airport in the world for days has caused havoc.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Atlanta, Georgia, United States? :raise:

But seriously, it looks like my friend won't be going to Germany anytime soon.

[neuro]

all airspace has been opened again as of 08:00 europeean time.

[Kornman00]

I was originally going to leave germany last week...guess it's a good thing I didn't, would have been grounded at fucking Frankfurt all weekend >_<. Would have had my birthday over here no matter what I guess

[Con]

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/more_from_eyjafjallajokull.html
awesome pics

http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/eyja_04_19/e30_23073889.jpg

[Cortexian]

It's going to get a lot warmer.

In Iceland.

:caruso:


On a more serious note, I don't really understand why they had to SHUTDOWN all the air traffic. It's not like modern day air travel requires VFR flying for anything except landings and takeoffs, and they can always fly around or above in most cases.

[Kornman00]

Seeing as how most flights travel in an arc along the Earth's round surface, it would put them up there near the UK where the ash clouds are traveling down to.

Also, think about that one single flight that goes down because of this. I don't think the airlines want to be paying the families of some 200ish passengers for something that could have been easily avoided.

Oh and I guess Ash Clouds are the only thing to stop the (international) mail from coming through. Rain, sleet or snow, it's a go. Ash clouds? Grounded.

[Bodzilla]

Ash is a shitload denser then snow, Your insane if you want to fly through something like that and subject your engines to that kind of treatment.

i'm pretty sure that a a few feet of ash on an ordinary rooftop is enough weight to collapse it, so would you honestly risk flying through that when you could just wait another couple of days.


Dont die for a deadline tbqh.

[Dwood]

Ash when going thru plain engines turns to glass guys.

[Kornman00]

Education about ash and planes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_cloud#Combustion_power_failure).

[Cortexian]

I never said anything about flying through the ash, for the record...

[=sw=warlord]

I never said anything about flying through the ash, for the record...

It's a little tricky not to fly through the ash when it's coming over the aerospace.

[Cortexian]

It's not that tricky to fly around on the other hand, or above.

[=sw=warlord]

It's not that tricky to fly around on the other hand, or above.


It's a little tricky not to fly through the ash when it's coming over the aerospace.
There have been people talking about getting ash on their cars in western Scotland, which is the opposite side to where Iceland happens to be.
you see the slight problem here?

[Cortexian]

... You guys sound like you think airplanes can only fly in certain areas? That's what it's coming out as... I've got my private pilots license and the only thing dictating where I can fly is (generally) if I'm in controlled airspace, 500ft above ground level (1000ft if it's a populated area), and the ceiling altitude my plane can reach. From what I can tell there shouldn't be any problems with flights going over the ash, since most jets fly well above it anyways. Obviously any areas actually experiencing ash coverage would have their airports shutdown, that doesn't mean you close all air traffic to a region if some airports are still accessible!

[English Mobster]

Freelancer, you're missing the point.

There is no way to tell how far the ash could extends, nor is there a way to tell how high it is. Sure, you could look at the cloud of ash and see where the bulk of it is, but there is still a sizable amount of ash in places AWAY from the main cloud, such as the example with Scotland in the post above yours.
The ash is impossible to see, since it is spread over such a wide area, but a small bit of that ash can build up and fuck up a plane's engines real good. Airlines don't want to risk damage to their aircraft or the public relations disaster that would be an ash-caused crash.
So, going by the motto of "It's better to be safe than sorry", they closed down any flights which have even a SLIGHT possibility of encountering some ash. Just because the ash cloud is not near the airport doesn't mean that there is no ash in the area, and thus it is better to assume that ALL airports have dangerous levels of unseen ash.

[Cortexian]

Meh, only effects jets to a catastrophic engine failure degree. Lots of large airlines use large prop-propelled aircraft for cargo/mail/etc.

Don't believe me? Lots of photos with prop planes and some helicopters on the direct vicinity of the volcano.

[Limited]

Planes can glide for up to 50 miles with no engines, but thats beside the point.

It is not known exactly how badly the ash can mess up engines, it will certainly stop them running, and planes would drop out the sky.

Its best to be precautions.

[Cortexian]

Again, I said nothing about gliding... I know first hand how far a plane can glide, and I also know that given appropriate space you can land one almost anywhere without your engine(s). We practiced glide-landing into the open field area beside the runway at the airport I learned to fly at. Granted that was a little Cessna but my instructor said that you could do the same with jets, though you may blow out the tires and landing gear causing you to slide along on your fuselage. That's fine if it's the only way to put down a plane full of people.

And like I said, jet engines would stop running, prop-based planes probably will eventually but if you've got a clean air filter and a well maintained engine that should be okay as well.

[English Mobster]

Keeping those filters clean would require a shitload of effort, as would traveling using only prop-based planes. While I'm not saying that it is impossible to fly in an ash cloud, it simply isn't feasible. There aren't enough prop-based planes available to handle the world's supply of mail, let alone passengers, and if one plane went down because of ash, even a mail-carrying plane, the company which sponsored the flight would suffer a public relations nightmare. That's a risk any company does not want to take.
Simply put, it's easier, safer, and more economical in the long run to take the financial hit and leave the flights grounded.

[Cortexian]

Yea I guess, I know most of the FedEx air fleet (at least what I've seen at our airport) are large multi-engine propeller planes. And you wouldn't have ANY issues flying through the scattered ash with one of those, you'd be good anywhere except a dense cloud of the stuff... So basically you'd be fine anywhere except right at the volcano.

[Kornman00]

I've got my private pilots license
Don't mean to thread jack but how much does getting your pilot's license in Canada cost? I take it it's only valid in Canada?

[Cortexian]

I got it through Cadets so I got paid by the Government to learn how to fly (something like $200 a week, nothing crazy). I think you're thinking of the "Recreational Pilots License" since that's the one that's only valid inside of Canada, I have my full Private Pilots License so it's valid Globally. From this point I could upgrade to a Commercial Pilot License which allows me to transport paying passengers, this includes your big airlines but not as a Captain. Then there's the Airline Transports Pilot License which lets you fly all the big jets as a Captain or whatever.

If you get it on your own though it costs somewhere around $8,000 - $10,000 for the license equivalent I have. A Commercial license is like $30,000 and I don't even know what the ATPL costs are like, probably insane because you need so many extra verifications on top of the base cost.

The military has their own pilots licenses, you need to retrain or some such if you have a military pilots license and want a private one, and visa-versa.

Edit: While I've got this post about planes and such I really need to point something out... You know all those "amazing" cross-wind landings you see on YouTube? They're fucking easy with the little planes we fly, think how easy it is with a jetliner that's got well over 1000 horsepower for correctional maneuvers?

Also, if you ever take a cruise or visit St Maarten in the Caribbean you need to check out their International Airport... There's a beach that we were at which you stand literally 50ft from the runway, and there's always big liners coming in, you get knocked over a bit by the bigger jets! :p
7PUcEbTbNzk

Luckily when I went with my mother my dad took off with the camera... And we didn't get to see any takeoffs:
CSNzogQAg0E

[Warsaw]

Meh, only effects jets to a catastrophic engine failure degree. Lots of large airlines use large prop-propelled aircraft for cargo/mail/etc.

Don't believe me? Lots of photos with prop planes and some helicopters on the direct vicinity of the volcano.

Most helicopters are jets, and a good portion of prop-driven aircraft are also jets (see turboshaft and turboprop, respectively). Just thought I should point that out. If you are talking about props, you can't say "prop-driven" and leave it at that, because the props used by airlines are turboprops, not piston engines. My guess is you can't put a filter capable of sifting out the ash on large industrial engines like that without losing significant thrust due to a choking of the compressor and fan.

[Cortexian]

Most of the cargo and mail fleet used by FedEx are most certainly not turbo-props. And I can say "prop-driven" and leave it at that because the technical term for turboshafts and turboprops is "prop-assisted" according to the Canadian Forces techs I was talking to that work on our Aurora's...

[Warsaw]

Most people aren't familiar with Canadian Forces technical jargon...:downs:.

"Prop-assisted" is misleading especially when the prop is the main driving force as opposed to the exhaust as in turbojets and turbofans. I think your techs should ponder over that for a little bit.

Over here, "prop-assisted" usually refers to turbofans and turbojets that have propfans somewhere on the assembly to improve fuel economy.

I live next to two airports: Dulles and Manassas Regional Airport. The big prop-driven planes I see fly over my house are almost always turboprops. Only occasionally do I ever see a piston-powered plane, and it's usually a small private craft. :|

[Cortexian]

Canadian Forces use the same technical jargon as every other military force when it comes to technical jargon. Probably different terminology in your civilian stuff.

[Warsaw]

Both points still stand. You can read that as "most people don't know aviation technical jargon", including me, if you want.

But hey, that's not what this thread is about. So, there's a show on the Science channel about whether or not volcano ash can cause jet engines to fail...I was under the impression that there have already been documented cases where it has happened, so why the question in the first place?

[Donut]

Dont die for a deadline tbqh.
:lol: just noticed this