It was a sight never seen before at Heathrow – the complete close of runways, taxiways, terminals, retail shops. In fact pretty well everything.
And it wasn’t a massive security threat but a simple volcano in Iceland spewing ash into the atmosphere which then drifted over Western Europe.
It brought the biggest crisis for European aviation in a generation as the shut down continued for a staggering total of eight days. In all it closed 300 airports across the continent with 100,000 flights cancelled and a loss of over a billion pounds to the industry.
At Heathrow they used the opportunity to do some maintenance work on the empty runways – but it was clear that they’d rather be flying. And aviation rules were very strict at the time. British Airways chief executive Willie Walsh went on the first flight out just to prove that things were safe.
The eruption of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano with its slowly drifting ash cloud took everyone by surprise and ultimately resulted in a great deal of research particularly by manufacturers into the tolerance of their aero engines to volcanic ash. The assumption now is that they would be much more relaxed by these levels.