Airlines at odds with regulators over ash risk

THE latest ash cloud crisis may have been averted — but European airspace regulators and airlines remain on a collision course over the risk to air safety from volcanic emissions.

Both British Airways (BA) chief executive Willie Walsh and Ryanair’s chief executive Michael O’Leary have expressed concerns about how ash levels were measured in the skies over Scotland and Northern England this week.

BA conducted a 45-minute test flight on Tuesday at different altitudes over the north of England, Newcastle, Glasgow and Edinburgh, where the ash cloud was meant to be at its densest. “The simple answer is we found nothing,” Mr Walsh said.