easyJet Reveals Progress on Volcanic Ash Detector
A new system designed to prevent a repeat of last year's travel chaos due to volcanic ash is making good progress, according to a statement today by cheap flights carrier easyJet.
The airline first revealed the development of an ash-detection system last summer, following the eruption of the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull. The ash cloud from that led to the cancellation of thousands of cheap flights to France, Spain and most of the rest of Europe, causing holidays misery for hundreds of thousands of travellers – and landing airlines with large compensation bills.
Today, easyJet called on the rest of the cheap flights and holidays sector to give greater support to the Airborne Volcanic Object Identifier and Detector (AVOID) project, in which it has already invested £1 million.
The AVOID project was originally devised by the Norwegian Institute for Air Research's senior scientist Fred Pata, and supplies images to pilots and flight control centres giving them early warnings of ash clouds and the ability to plot new flight paths to avoid the problem. The technology is similar to that already in use to detect extreme weather systems.
The cheap fares airline said today that a prototype is now ready for testing in a real volcanic ash cloud. However, for this to happen, the European Aviation Safety Agency needs to grant permission and more financial support is required by the European Commission said easyJet – adding that it is in talks with both bodies.
The airline's head of engineering Ian Davies added: "We can't predict exactly when another volcano will erupt and send an ash cloud into European airspace, but we can say with certainty that it will happen at some stage. Our industry is better prepared today than it was last year, but we need to go further."
Travel Industry News posted by 
on 15 April 2011
