Sea-Tac's Icelandair, BA, Others, Grounded by Iceland Volcano's Ash Plume

The MODIS instrument on NASA's Terra satellite captured an Ash plume from Eyjafjallajokull Volcano over the North Atlantic at 11:35 UTC (7:35 a.m. EDT) on April 15, 2010. Credit: NASA/MODIS Rapid Response Team

That stream of volcanic ash that looks like the Big Muddy has thrown commercial airlines into a logistical turmoil not seen since 9/11.

Sea-Tac's Icelandair flights aren't going anywhere near the ash. A special volcano alert reveals that flights to London, Stockholm, Oslo, and Copenhagen have been canceled. [UPDATE: But they are flying to Iceland tonight, now that the ash has been exported--see this post's comments.] It's not just Icelandair, if you're planning on flying: because of the ash plume, officials have now shut down airspace in Britain, Ireland, France, and Scandinavia. The ash may invade Germany's airspace next.

Europe's busiest--and simply terrible--airport Heathrow is closed, and everyone at British Airways is facing a long, long day. The Washington Post quotes an aircraft safety expert as saying it could take up to two days, once the volcano stops erupting, for flights to resume.

When will the eruption stop? ABC asked Einar Kjartansson, a geophysicist at the Icelandic Meteorological Office: "It is likely that the production of ash will continue at a comparable level for some days or weeks."

Here, NASA explains why planes don't fly through volcanic ash--it gets sucked into engines, and its etching ruins cockpit visibility. For more on the volcano itself, don't miss these photos of the Eyjafjallajokull eruption on KOMO's site. Evacuation has been more widespread with this more violent eruption (ten to twenty times more powerful than the earlier March eruption), as glacier melt has fed rivers and led to flooding.