O’Leary hits out at aviation authorities

RYANAIR boss Michael O’Leary has questioned the need to ground aircraft during the Icelandic volcano eruption and claimed the models used for predicting the movement of ash clouds are flawed.

The airline’s chief executive hit out at aviation authorities after he was forced to cancel almost 70 flights between Ireland, Scotland and mainland Europe when a high density cloud from the Grimsvotn volcano was detected in Scottish airspace.

Mr O’Leary spent the day berating Britain’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and the British Met Office, accusing them of “incompetence”, dismissing the ash cloud hazard as “mythical” and claiming the reports used to back up their grounding order are “duff”.