PHOTOS, PAGE 1

       Editor and prime reporter is Doug Terry, a veteran television and radio reporter in   Washington, DC, (details below)

Something’s gotta give. European air traffic is in shutdown and no one knows for certain if all of this is necessary. The suspicion is rising that it is an overreaction to the ash cloud. Here is a clip from a story in today’s (4.18.10) New York Times:

With airlines eager to reposition aircraft and flight crews scattered across the region, some governments began allowing limited, low-altitude flights without passengers. Germany’s civil aviation authority said it had allowed several such ferry flights by Lufthansa, Air Berlin and Condor airlines overnight. Such flights are being operated under so-called visual flight rules, whereby pilots navigate by sight, rather than relying on their cockpit instrument panels.

“I understand the requirement for safety,” said Dale Moss, the chief executive of OpenSkies, the Paris-based, all-business-class subsidiary of British Airways, in an interview Sunday. “But the level of frustration is painfully high” for both airlines and passengers, he said.

“We need some scientific data quick, so that we can start projecting and putting contingency plans in place,” he said.

As posted Saturday on the TerryReport, it is a safe bet that some changes short of total shutdown will be devised in a few days. The fact that Germany is allowing “ferry” flights without passengers indicates that it is safe to fly at lower altitudes. The risk is that, in trying to avoid a crash, Euro air control authorities are creating another disaster on the ground and for the airline’s survival.

Doug Terry, 4.18.10

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