AI, Kingfisher cancel London-bound flights due to volcanic ash

Air India did not operate its Mumbai-London and New Delhi-London flight. However, its Amritsar-London-Toronto flight was scheduled to take off at 3:30 pm according to an AI spokesperson.
Private carrier Kingfisher cancelled all its flights to London."Having assessed the current information received from Eurocontrol, and the trends indicating anticipated closure of the airspace over London Heathrow airport due to fresh contamination of volcanic ash, Kingfisher Airlines has cancelled its flights to and from London airport on May 17," its spokesperson told PTI here.

The airline, however, said that since the situation was dynamic and changing, it would take a call on its London flights for Tuesday later.Jet Airways said that all its flights to London were on schedule.

The airspace over London's Heathrow Airport and Schiphol airport in Amsterdam, Europe's another biggest air travel hubs, closed this morning as a dense cloud of volcanic ash drifted from Iceland.

The restrictions affecting Heathrow -- as well as Gatwick, Stansted and London City airports -- will be in place until at least 7 a m local time (1130 IST), the aviation authority said.Air India said the passengers who could not fly on Monday would be accommodated in Tuesday's flight.

"Air India will operate a 747-400-aircraft (a bigger aircraft) on its Mumbai-London sector tomorrow, which is scheduled to take off at 2.20 am. The passengers who could not fly today will be accommodated in this flight," an Air India spokesperson told PTI here.
This is the second time in the last one month that volcanic ash has disrupted flights services to Europe.

Last month, airspace across Europe was shut down for about a week after the Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland erupted with its ash spreading in most parts of the European skies