In Reply to: Only if you fly thru the ash !! posted by trisha on Monday, 15. May 2006 at 17:27 Bali Time:
A good family friend known as Aunty June was on that British Airways 747 flight that was very nearly downed by the volcanic ash. A VERY scary experience, they lost all 4 engines 1 after the other and decended to about 3500feet before they could be restarted. The ash cloud is so fine it didn't show up on their radar, but managed to clog the engines and cause flameouts on all 4 of them! The pilot was very calm & controlled during the event, and kept all the passengers informed of exactly what was happening as they were losing their engines.The pilots also had no vision as the windscreen was 'sand blasted' by the ash, and had to land 'blind' on some remote Indonesian airstrip. After changing planes and arriving back in Perth, Aunty June never flew again - can you blame her? I would imagine that even now, all flights are being rerouted to avoid the ash cloud.