Not only do I receive 103583015 calls from pilots every day asking me when the ash is going to clear (sorry I'm not a volcanist), but this volcano has stopped all traffic into and out of most of Europe for the better part of yesterday, today, and probably into at least the beginning of the week!
Overall, it really is fascinating to me how crazy and strong mother nature is. We are able to chart and monitor winds aloft and use that to predict where the ash will flow...we also consider a lot of European model data and European charts that are released every 6 hours which forecast where the ash plume will spread.
Forecasting it's movement is hard because of the complexity of the situation -- high pressure over Europe continues to drive winds in a northwesterly to southeasterly flow spreading all the ash and soot from Iceland directly into the UK region and into central Europe. Unfortunately, this high pressure is not budging over the next several days...and the volcano keeps erupting spreading it's ash downstream. Also a scary side-note, there's apparently a bigger sister-type volcano to this one who historically likes to erupt after Eyjafjallajokull blows.
This is the worst aviation problem in history -- thousands and thousands stranded in airports all over Europe...and delays and cancellations that have effected all continents of the world. I've seen pictures of people sleeping in airports, and I've read articles describing how people take taxis, ferries, trains, or all three just to get to another city within Europe. Volcanic ash (made of soot & glass particles) if sucked up by an engine will completely shut them down and possibly crash a plane...so this is something not to mess with -- and unavoidable until it clears. Absolutely amazing and so incredibly powerful how we, as smart technologically-savvy humans, can do nothing but sit...and wait.
Here's an example of what we look at when we talk to the pilots (basically tells it helps describe the flight levels of the ash) -- the boxes are the forecasted areas of the ash plume...notice it going all the way towards China and stretching back all the way almost to eastern Canada. All of Europe is effected.
On a lighter note...a funny video my friend sent us from her Aunt who lives in Iceland..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
That remind me of the scene from Dante's Peak with the helicopter. Scary stuff! Very amusing video. I wouldn't even attempt to say that name. lol
ReplyDeletethat map looks like greek. i definitely dont envy your job right now! i've told some friends at law school what your job is and one of them actually asked me today how my "meteorologist friend" likes this volcano business haha
ReplyDeletehahaa that's so funny M ! today was the worst so far b/c they started opening up airspace in Europe so we had a bunch of flights try to get out -- it's still a mess over there but slowly getting better :)
ReplyDeletechristine -- I totally forgot about Dante's Peak until you mentioned that!