Airlines across the Asia-Pacific region scrambled to reschedule or cancel flights yesterday after a vast cloud of volcanic ash closed swathes of European airspace.
From Wellington to Tokyo, passengers heading to Europe faced an uncertain wait as the eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano forced the biggest airspace shutdown since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Airlines warned the fallout from the eruption could take days to clear, leaving thousands of passengers stranded.
Taiwan’s China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) canceled the Bangkok-Amsterdam leg of its CI165 and CI166 flights between Taipei and Amsterdam, while EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空) dropped its Taipei-Paris round-trip flights and was scheduled to announce later in the day whether it would also cancel its Taipei-Vienna flights.
Australia’s Qantas Airways said it may not be able to resume flights to London and Frankfurt until tomorrow.
Qantas spokesman David Epstein urged passengers not to head to airports in the hope that flights may resume soon.
“Do not be optimistic about flights tomorrow [Saturday],” he said, adding that it “may take until Sunday unless we hear something better from European authorities.”
Five 24-hour flights leaving Australia for Europe on Thursday were grounded after they stopped for refueling in Singapore, Hong Kong and Bangkok, with passengers booked into hotels.
Air New Zealand canceled flights to and from London, and the company’s international group general manager Ed Sims said travelers faced “a very uncertain situation.”
Japan Airlines canceled nine flights to and from Paris, Amsterdam, London, Milan and Frankfurt, affecting more than 2,000 customers.
All Nippon Airways said it canceled six flights, affecting more than 1,500 people.
Although not visible from the ground, volcanic ash can be highly dangerous to aircraft, clogging up the engines and reducing visibility, experts say.
An estimated 5,000 to 6,000 flights were canceled on Thursday alone as gray ash blew across the north Atlantic.
Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific said it had delayed or canceled a dozen flights to London, Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam. About half the Cathay flights were delayed to today, while the remainder were canceled.
British Airways canceled two flights scheduled to depart Hong Kong last night bound for London’s Heathrow airport.
KLM Royal Dutch Airlines canceled one flight last night to Amsterdam from Hong Kong, while German carrier Lufthansa pulled a Frankfurt-bound flight scheduled to leave yesterday afternoon.
Indian airlines Air India, Kingfisher Airlines and Jet Airways have all canceled flights to London because of the drifting ash.
Singapore Airlines said it had canceled seven flights to and from Europe, while Malaysia Airlines said its flights to London, Amsterdam and Paris had been disrupted by the eruption.
A scheduled flight to London from Kuala Lumpur was diverted to Frankfurt on Thursday, while two other flights to London and Amsterdam, and one to Paris were delayed until further notice.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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