Travelmole’s Man from the Ministry airs his views on the ash cloud fiasco

Skye Maxwell, our Man from the Ministry,  gives an inside view on the ash cloud disruption and asks whether O’Leary might well have a point this time.

"The impact of the Mount Eyjafjallajöekull volcano’s violent ejection of millions of tonnes of ash thousands of feet into the atmosphere in April and May 2010 will continue to be felt around the world for years to come.

Air space closures following the eruption resulted in over 100,000 flight cancellations associated with European markets over six days in April causing losses estimated to be a $1.8 billion or more, according to IATA.

Passenger safety is and must remain paramount. On this occasion, the regulatory authorities reacted in haste to protect the public, and rightly so. Airlines were left to repent at leisure; their flights suspended.

It may be unfair to characterise what happened as a reasonable immediate reaction followed by the imposition of an inflexible ‘one size fits all’ approach to flight suspension as part of a common approach to air safety, but rightly or wrongly, that is how it appeared.

The airline industry resorted to a researched, co-ordinated approach to the understanding of the nature of the threat. The level of threat posed to aircraft, aero engines and passengers was rapidly evaluated by the airlines in conjunction with aero engine manufacturers, aircraft manufacturers, regulatory authorities and others. The regulatory authorities reviewed their own approach to flight suspension and a more flexible policy emerged.

The appropriate role for aviation authorities in general and EASA, the European Aviation Safety Agency in particular has come under close scrutiny, not least by EASA itself as a result of what has been learned.

One thing is clear, if aviation safety policy is to be co-ordinated at European level, a one size fits all policy needs to be tempered by greater flexibility allowing for local conditions to be taken into account when deciding whether to suspend airline services or not.

In the meantime, a solution minimising the need for regulatory interference has emerged. Volcanic ash could have a significantly less disruptive impact on aviation in the future thanks to new technology.

Dr Fred Prata of the Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU) has come to the industry’s rescue with a new technology called AVOID (Airborne Volcanic Object Identifier and Detector). EasyJet will be the first airline to test the new system.

The system uses infrared technology to help determine the density of an ash cloud and the level of threat posed to aircraft. According to EasyJet the new system supplies images to both the pilots and an airline’s flight control centre.

The chief executive of the Civil Aviation Authority, Andrew Haines, has welcomed the development, but cautions that there is a need to work together to minimise disruptions should the ash return.

One lasting impact of the volcanic ash is as a catalyst to ensure better crisis management of future threats to aviation, through better development and co-ordination of aviation safety policy and ‘Avoid’ could be the solution to ash cloud induced flight suspensions!

nb: The Mount Eyjafjallajöekull volcano is no longer emitting any ash, only steam. This may prove to be only a brief interlude before further explosive activity according to the experts.

Compensation and airline regulation
The ash cloud induced flight suspensions in April and May 2010 with their dire impact on airline finances has brought into sharp focus the unintended consequences of well intentioned legislation.

At the height of the ash cloud crisis with airline losses mounting, demands for compensation by airlines and travel companies alike flowed almost as fast as the lava and ash filled the air.

Compensation claims were fuelled by airlines’ understandable anger and frustration at the impact of European regulations designed to protect the traveller.

The airlines saw nothing wrong in the passenger being compensated, just who pays the compensation! Current regulations lay the financial burden at the doorstep of the airlines!

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary highlighted precisely why airlines felt so aggrieved. The airlines were not suspending services by choice. They were being required to do so by the competent authorities, whether or not the circumstances were in the view of the airlines, justified.

European legislation intended to protect the traveller seeks to ensure that where airlines cancel flights of their own volition, travellers are properly compensated by the airline responsible.
Should airlines be forced to compensate passengers in circumstances where the regulatory authorities have required them to suspend flights? This is what airlines are forced to do now.

Whilst recognising passengers should be compensated where their flight is cancelled, few would argue that it is fair or reasonable to place the burden on the airlines to pay up where they are being required to cancel flights by a competent authority.

The current situation is presumably an ‘unintended’ effect of existing legislation, or have the airlines been seen as just another cash cow to tap to avoid the burden falling on governments’ faced with difficult decisions?

Giovanni Bisignani, IATA’s director general and CEO, has backed the call for airlines to be compensated because he argues the authorities made the wrong call in suspending airline services in the way they did.

Compensation to the airlines for lost revenue is one issue that needs to be addressed, but so too is making airlines responsible to passengers for the actions of governments. The airlines have a legitimate case for compensation for lost revenue. They also have a strong case for having the existing legislation amended so that governments take the responsibility for compensating passengers where they are directly responsible.

Michael O’Leary is clearly not alone in his belief that: "If governments close airspace, the governments should reimburse passengers, not the airlines”."