British Airways sends test flight into volcanic ash cloud zone

Jet plane crewed by two BA pilots and two engineers flies through ‘red-zone’ hanging above Scotland British Airways flight 9271E had an unconventional cargo and destination. There were no passengers on the A320 aeroplane, which took off on Tuesday evening and flew north through a swath of UK airspace that contained, according to Met Office forecasts, a high density of volcanic ash. Crewed by two BA pilots and a pair of observers from the airline’s engineering department, the jet flew at various altitudes through a “red-zone” that hung above much of Scotland and had grounded thousands of travellers beneath it. There was no special monitoring equipment onboard, except for two cameras that were brought to record evidence of ash clouds but were in the end not needed. “We did not have any specialist equipment, hence the observers to put some additional eyeballs onboard with the ability to walk up and down the cabin in case we smelled anything,” said Garry Copeland, BA’s director of engineering who was on the flight. Copeland said there was no evidence of volcanic pollution throughout a 45-minute trip that charted a course from Manchester to Newcastle, Glasgow, Edinburgh and London Heathrow, flying through the red zone much of the time. Asked if he was apprehensive while the plane waited to be cleared for take-off, Copeland said: “Not at all. We took it very seriously but not in terms of any safety concerns. We were very confident that we were not going to encounter any heavy ash.”After the flight the A320′s twin engines, equipped with new filters, were inspected with the type of telescopic video camera that is also used in pinhole surgery, again finding no evidence of contamination. BA had scrutinised weather maps from various forecasting organisations and was sure that there would be no ash, despite different predictions from the Met Office’s Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre (VAAC) in Exeter. “As an engineer, my way of doing business is to make sure we use all the tools available,” said Copeland, adding that BA was not disregarding the VAAC model but wanted to include other forecasts. Under the current guidelines, UK airlines must abide by VAAC forecasts whereas US and Middle Eastern airlines use predictions by forecaster WSI, which pointed to lower densities of ash. “We wanted to fly in an area of forecast heavy ash to ensure that our procedures for avoiding dense ash were resilient,” he added. The flight had been cleared by the Civil Aviation Authority, the UK’s aviation safety regulator. Copeland added that BA pilots are well-versed in avoiding ash because their aircraft often fly routes where volcanic eruptions are a potential hazard. “The primary guidance is to avoid flying in visible ash, which shows up as a dark cloud. In times when it is not visible, such as in the dark, you can sense a sulphuric smell or see indications of static electricity, like a bluish glow,” he said. BA hopes that the verification flight will define high-density zones more closely, allowing airlines to fly through areas that are, in fact, uncontaminated. “The intention is to find safe ways of continuing operations,” said Copeland. “As engineers we are hard-wired to do that.” Iceland volcano 2011 (Grimsvotn) Iceland Natural disasters and extreme weather Airline industry British Airways Travel & leisure Dan Milmo guardian.co.uk

Posted by on May 25, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.