Heathrow closes as ash falls

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MORE DELAYS: A traveller rests with her luggage as flights are delayed and cancelled at Heathrow Airport in London.

ASH PROBLEMS: Stray horses cross a road in Eyjafjoll as the volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier continues to erupt with no signs of the explosive activity about to end.

TRAVEL WRECKER: A fresh cloud of ash rises from the volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland.

VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS: A fresh cloud of ash and lava eruptions are seen in the volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland.

ASH SETTLES: A vehicle travels past vegetation along a road covered with volcanic ash in Eyjafjoll. The volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland is continuing to erupt with no signs of the explosive activity about to end.

ICELANDIC VOLCANO: An ash cloud from the Eyjafjallajokull volcanic eruption sweeps across the countryside in southern Iceland near the village of Asolfsskali.

LIGHTS OVER VOLCANO: The Northern Lights can be seen above the still erupting Icelandic volcano.

ERUPTIONS CONTINUE: A volcano erupts near Eyjafjallajokull.

ERUPTIONS CONTINUE: Lava spews from a volcano as it erupts near Eyjafjallajokull.

AT LAST: Richard Young hugs his wife, Sarah, of Bristol, UK, after she arrives from Vancouver at Heathrow Airport.

LANDED: Passengers arrive from Vancouver on the first flight in five days, due to volcanic ash, at Heathrow Airport.

HAPPY: An Air Berlin plane lands at Tegel airport in Berlin after it was partly opened to traffic.

SIMMERING DOWN: The sun rises behind an erupting volcano near Eyjafjallajokull, Iceland.

LAVA FLOW: Lava spews from a volcano in Eyjafjallajokull.

LESS ASH: Molten lava shoots out of an erupting volcano near Eyjafjallajokull.

DIRTY WATER: A woman stands near a waterfall that has been dirtied by ash that has accumulated from the ash plume of an erupting volcano near Eyjafjallajokull.

LIGHTING UP THE SKIES: Lightning streaks across the sky as lava flows from a volcano in Eyjafjallajokull, Iceland, that has caused air travel chaos across Europe.

FARMERS FEARS: Farmer Thorarinn Olafsson tries to lure his horse back to the stable as a cloud of black ash looms overhead in Drangshlid 2 at Eyjafjoll.

STOPPED BY ASH: A passenger rests on the empty seats of a deserted terminal at Zurich airport in Kloten after all flights were grounded due to volcanic ash in the skies over Europe.

A view of the town of Vik, which suffered from power outages, due to ash dissipation, April 16, 2010.

Ash continues to billow from the volcano in Eyjafjallajokull, April 16, 2010.

A church, engulfed in ash from a nearby volcano, is seen near Vik April 16, 2010.

VIEW FROM SPACE: The ice-covered summit of Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano can be seen with fluid magma erupting and a lava flow spreading northeast, spilling into Hrunagil Gully in this image provided from NASA's Earth Observing (EO-1) satellite.

A cloud of volcanic ash is seen spreading from the southern side of Iceland in this handout satellite photograph.

ASH CLOUD: A plume of volcanic ash rises into the atmosphere from a crater under about 200 metres of ice at the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in southern Iceland.

ASH CLOUD: A plume of volcanic ash rises six to 11km into the atmosphere, from a crater under 200m of ice at the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in southern Iceland.

VOLCANO FLOOD: An aerial photo from the Icelandic Coast Guard shows flood caused by a volcanic eruption at Eyjafjalla Glacier. The volcanic eruption Partially melted a glacier, setting off a major flood that threatened to damage roads and bridges and forcing hundreds to evacuate.

DELAYS: A screen informs passengers at City Airport that all flights have been cancelled after ash from a volcanic eruption in Iceland caused the UK's airspace to be closed, in London.

WAITING GAME: A passenger looks at an information screen at the departures area in Madrid Airport.

IN FOR A LONG HAUL: Passengers wait in the departures area of Tenerife airport.

DELAYED: Passengers wait in line for their connecting flights at Schiphol Airport.

STRANDED: Passengers in Arlanda Airport outside Stockholm.

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LATEST: Air New Zealand has warned its flights to London could be disrupted at Hong Kong and Los Angeles tonight following the closure of Heathrow Airport in London due to ash from Iceland's volcano.

It comes as airports throughout the UK, including the London airports of Gatwick and Heathrow, have been forced to close due to a dense cloud of volcanic ash drifting over from Iceland.

Heathrow is currently closed for air travel until at least 10pm tonight (NZ time).

The airline's statement says flights NZ39 to London via Hong Kong and NZ2 to London via Los Angeles are still scheduled to operate tonight, but may be disrupted.

Meanwhile a current NZ2 flight which is now in Los Angeles has been delayed for departure to London by 19 hours.

"Should passengers still decide to travel on NZ2 and NZ39 this evening and there are disruptions to their plans, costs incurred will be at their expense," the airline says.

The no-fly zone over Ireland, parts of Scotland and England has been extended to include Heathrow and Gatwick airports, the National Air Traffic Service (NATS) said.

Heathrow, Europe's busiest airport, will be closed from 12pm NZT to 6pm NZT on Monday as the high density of a volcanic ash cloud from Iceland drifts south.

"The high density ash cloud continues to move further south in the early hours of tomorrow morning", it said in a statement.

Airports included in the no-fly zone include Heathrow, Gatwick and London City, the key cities of Manchester and Liverpool, all airfields in Northern Ireland and airports in parts of Scotland, NATS said in a statement.

Airports in Birmingham, about 175km northwest of London, and Norwich, on England's east cost, were to close early Sunday evening.

In Ireland, Dublin's international airport was closing early Sunday evening until at least 9am Monday (8pm NZT). Airports along Ireland's west coast were closed until noon Monday but Shannon and Cork were open "until further notice."

The British air traffic agency said the ash cloud was changing shape and moving south, toward Oxford, 100km northwest of London. Britain's weather service says the northwest winds should shift midweek, redirecting the ash away from Britain.

German authorities sent up two test flights Sunday to measure the ash cloud, one from the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and the other from Lufthansa, the country's biggest airline.

The DLR plane flew to southern England then continued north, collecting data from between 10,000 to 23,000 feet (3000 to 7000 metres). The Lufthansa Airbus A340-600, equipped with special scientific gear, left Frankfurt to fly over northern Germany, the United Kingdom and parts of Scandinavia.

All the data from both flights was immediately sent to aviation authorities in the UK, the Netherlands and Germany, said aerospace centre spokesman Andreas Schuetz.

Ash can clog jet engines. The April 14 eruption at Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano forced most countries in northern Europe to shut their airspace between April 15-20, grounding more than 100,000 flights and an estimated 10 million travellers worldwide. The shutdown cost airlines more than $2 billion.

In southern Iceland, activity at the volcano fluctuated Sunday but did not get more intense, civil protection official Agust Gunnar Gylfason said. He blamed the closures on shifting winds.

"What really changes the situation is the weather pattern," he said.

The Icelandic weather service said "presently there are no indications that the eruption is about to end."

Airlines complained bitterly over the air space closures last month, calling them an overreaction. The European air safety agency last week proposed drastically narrowing the continent's no-fly zone because of volcanic ash to 190km like the one used in the US. The proposal still must be approved.

Virgin Atlantic's president, Sir Richard Branson, criticised British authorities for Sunday's no-fly zone. British Airways agreed, calling the approach "overly restrictive and not justified on safety grounds" and saying airlines are best qualified to determine whether it's safe to fly.

"The closing of Manchester airspace once again is beyond a joke," Branson said in a statement. He said test flights have "shown no evidence that airlines could not continue to fly completely safely."

A spokesman for Britain's Civil Aviation Authority called Branson's remarks "surprising" because airline representatives and engine manufacturers last week had agreed to find a way to ensure planes could fly safely in the volcanic ash.

"We as an organisation can't just say, 'Oh, I'm sure it's all right, go fly without evidence it's safe,'" Jonathan Nicholson said.

British Airways, facing cabin crew strikes beginning Tuesday, said it had cancelled a small number of flights out of Manchester. The airline's chief executive, Willie Walsh, is to meet with British Transport Secretary Philip Hammond on Monday.

Eurostar, which runs trains between Britain and continental Europe, said it was adding four extra trains - an additional 3500 seats - between London and Paris on Monday.

Eyjafjallajokul erupted in April for the first time in nearly two centuries. During its last eruption, starting in 1821, its emissions rumbled on for two years.

AIR NZ's ADVICE:

"If passengers decide not to travel, they will be entitled to re-book on another Air New Zealand flight when airspace reopens (conditions apply) or, if they have not yet commenced their travel and are ticketed on an Air New Zealand ticket, will be entitled to claim a refund."

NZ1 from London scheduled to depart at 4.15pm on Monday 17 May (UK time) will be delayed a similar period of time, with a new departure time to be advised.

Other Air New Zealand flights continue to operate.

"Passengers with onward flights to UK/Europe on another carrier need to be aware that these services could be affected also and should check with that carrier," the airline says.

- © Fairfax NZ News