Eyjafjallajökull

Well Paul Simons did warn us. Many people may still not realise that that is what is happening to them today, because nobody on the radio dares say the word. Through primitive atavistic fear, the sort of superstition which forbids the naming of The Scottish Play? No, a simple but total inability to pronounce the name.

Eyjafjallajökull.

The grounding of all flights to & from UK airspace will have all kinds of consequences, good, bad, maybe happy, for the lives of thousands of people whose plans have been so unexpectedly disrupted. And we are getting a very good illustration of how modern communications have transformed the reaction to such events. One reporter found an almost deserted regional airport – people were not turning up unaware of what had happened & forming angry queues. They have not had to rely on harassed airline staff for information about what is going on. Radio 5 even took a call from a man in Shanghai airport; his flight back to London had been cancelled, he needed to get back to be with is wife who is going into hospital. Radio 5 was providing him, via his laptop, with continuous updates; his office back in London had been able to book him on a flight later today from Hong Kong, which, with any luck will land him in London early tomorrow morning. Even 10 years ago he might still have been stranded with no clear idea at all of what was going on, with no way of judging what might be his best course of action.

Monday was a golden day – literally – a trick of the light shining down through a high haze. I even noticed for the first time ever a group of irregular-shaped fields high on one of the hills which fit together as an almost perfect pentagon – this showed up because they are all planted with some find of grain which under that light showed up pale yellow amidst the surrounding green. I must search out some learned treatise on the field patterns of the ancient Peak District, there must be such a thing, maybe written by some C18th or C19th antiquary.

We may get some spectacular sunsets over the next few days or weeks because of all this volcanic dust in the air. But I fear summer may be cancelled.

Links
Iceland volcano: Why a cloud of ash has grounded flights

How Captain Eric Moody's brush with volcanic ash became aircraft lore

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