VOLCANIC ASH CLOUD:BUSINESS AT the State's airports began returning to normal yesterday on a phased basis after five days of disruption.
Dublin airport communications manager Siobhán Moore said there had been a “very smooth, seamless” start-up yesterday morning at the time of the busiest passenger traffic. “It went very well,” she said.
A phased start-up had helped and meant there was not a “glut” of pressure on the facility. The restoration of business as usual was “such a relief all round” for everyone at the airport. It was a relief to see passengers buzzing around again, Ms Moore added.
Shortly after 6pm yesterday the airport very much appeared to have returned to normal.
The departures area was almost empty and very few flights were delayed or cancelled. There were no queues and the ticket desks and information areas were dealing with just a few inquiries from passengers.
The arrivals hall was much busier with incoming passenger traffic and people waiting to greet them. Flights from Bologna, Bordeaux, Amsterdam and the Isle of Man had all landed in a 10-minute period before 6pm.
Aer Lingus said all flights between Ireland and the UK, Europe and US are scheduled to operate today. It will provide 500 extra seats to accommodate passengers travelling on the Malaga, Madrid, Lanzarote, Lisbon and Rome routes.
Ryanair’s southbound flights from Spain, southern Italy, southern France, Malta and Morocco continued as normal yesterday.
All the airline’s flights in northern Europe (except those between Ireland and the UK) operated as scheduled from 5am yesterday.
Ryanair said all flights between Ireland and Britain, including domestic routes, will resume normal schedules from today. It is also making extra flights available from Ireland to European destinations, and from Britain to Europe, tomorrow.
Yesterday EasyJet expected fly a full schedule of over 1,100 flights.
Both Cork and Shannon airports’ services were almost back to normal yesterday.
Dublin Port said a record 72,000 passengers – nearly three times the normal number – passed through the port between Thursday of last week and Wednesday this week.
Meanwhile, the Government Taskforce on Emergency Planning met yesterday for the eighth time. It said the number of calls to the crisis response centre operated by the Department of Foreign Affairs had reduced “very substantially” to 150 calls on Wednesday, down from 808 on Tuesday and 1,100 on Monday. The centre is open to deal with outstanding queries, including those related to travellers stranded in long-haul destinations. Met Éireann said the ash plume would not be near Irish airspace over the next four to five days.