So was the flying ban the right thing to do?

[chuckskull]

Gotta be safety first on this one. I'm sure the vast majority of the airspace is fine. It's the small pockets that aren't, that a 747 can't detect, avoid or compensate for that are the danger. 1 plane wanders into one of those areas, that's a few hundred lives ended right there. Many more on the ground being a real possibility too.

[Saracen]

That's fair. What I can't understand is that a 'Wonderboy' has been created from the blandness of the campaign. I think it's just a desperate attempt to generate interest.

To be honest, Santa, I think it's precisely because of the feeling I elucidated in that post, though the motivation goes a bit deeper.

First, the debate turned him from Nick-who??? into "that nice-sounding bloke that isn't Tory or Labour". There's more than an element of "none-of-the-above" in that sentiment, and a dollop of "pox on both your houses", too.

Most people don't pay much attention to politics and, for them at least, they probably either hadn't heard of him, or certainly hadn't seem much of him.

I think the expenses scandal and other sundry political issues feed into that feeling of complete and utter disenchantment with both Labour and Tory. Labour are suffering badly from a televisual personality deficit in Brown, and from his having been running the economy for 13 years, and the results we're all seeing. Cameron is suffering from being a smug posh git that is seen as rather policy-less, and perhaps, Blair Lite.

Neither appeals much. But, if you were watching the TV debate the inference is you're at least interested enough in politics to want to vote for someone, and probably confused as hell about who it should be. Wonderboy did, I must admit, do a slick job of tapping into that, of simply being an alternative to two rather unappealing, and positively disingenuous choices. He has, currently, the rather obvious advantage of simply not being the other two. If you're fed up with things as they are, and suddenly find a personable choice that isn't "as things are", it's going to have an appeal. Whether that translates into actual votes on ballots remains to be seen. I'm not convinced it will, but I'm sure not convinced it won't.

May 7th should be interesting .... possibly shocking. I don't believe Clegg can win, but he sure might change the electoral map.

Anyway, off-topic I suppose, but that's how I think he managed it ..... fed up and disenchanted voters finding another option.

[peterb]

Hardly. Tut tut Peter, you don't belong on that bandwagon.

True, it was a cheap shot, but it is so rare for you leave such an easy target, it seemed churlish to pass it by!

That's fair. What I can't understand is that a 'Wonderboy' has been created from the blandness of the campaign. I think it's just a desperate attempt to generate interest.

Yes, although I suspect a trained monkey could have been set up as wunderboy after the performance of the other two.

On another note - and completely off the original topic - I happened to be reading the Ministerial Code (don't ask!) which mentions (para6.2) that public buildings should not be used by Ministers for party political purposes.

I noticed that an new hospital building (in Birmingham) was used by the Prime Minister at the start of the campaign, and that yesterday, the press were refused admission to a school that the PM was visiting on the grounds that "It should not be used for political purposes".

I'm sure other parliamentary candidates have used public buildings (especially schools and hospitals) in their campaign, but they are not Ministers of the Crown, although I think there are other rules that may be applicable.

[TheAnimus]

Then you thought wrong.

How do you mean?

I've not seen any news that this was a decision by the government, all the evidence points to a discussion between NATS and their foreign counterparts reaching a effected zone consensus.

So this evidence is the news wire services, reuters and bloomberg, as well as euronews, sky news, beeb news......

But I guess they could all be wrong, because gordo is like those fairies of bubblegum forest, he is only able to work his magic if you *really* believe it!

The idea that when I fly (hopefully!) on friday the decision has been made by a politician frankly fills me with fear, as most of them don't know which end of the jet engine the expense form goes in.

Not to mention the fact that would imply that gorden lets make every wrong call possible (selling gold at all time low, cutting the VAT to boost our deficit...) well I wouldn't get near that plane!

[kalniel]

The government didn't make the decision to fly. The Conservatives are saying that they should have done, but I'm with the government in thinking it should be left to the experts.

[santa claus]

----- fed up and disenchanted voters finding another option.

Yep, makes sense. I dunno, Cable & Clegg sounds like a firm of undertakers. Let's hope that's not prophetic.

True, it was a cheap shot, but it is so rare for you leave such an easy target, it seemed churlish to pass it by!

And who am I to deny you such a simple but rewarding pleasure? . I think you know though that I expected flak....

How do you mean?

I thought it was a Government decision based on the advice of the experts. Apologies if I'm wrong.

The government didn't make the decision to fly. The Conservatives are saying that they should have done, but I'm with the government in thinking it should be left to the experts.

Me too, although a decision with that impact must surely have fallen to the Government on the advice of its experts?

[oolon]

Personally I think the flight ban might still be enforce if BA had not forced peoples hands, flying in 16 plane yesterday and with a.. Look they are in the sky you going to let them land Attitude! Willy Walsh was on the test fight to wales at the weekend, he was not going to risk is own life if there was a reasonable chance of problems, unlike most people here I think it was an over reaction... for anything over 1-2 days, after all this could go on for weeks or months. Authority should have worked out far faster how to fly around (over/under) the problem, rather and hope it goes away.

[santa claus]

------Willy Walsh was on the test fight to wales at the weekend, he was not going to risk is own life if there was a reasonable chance of problems

Bet he was wearing a parachute

[Kata]

The only time a commercial jet has ever even had engine failure from an encounter with volcanic ash has been when it has flown through the thick, black, billowing, obvious plume direct from the volcano; even then, they restarted the engines when out of the plume and landed safely.

The people who think that an airliner flying in perfectly clear skies with vanishingly small quanitities of volcanic dust is going to plummet to its doom have simply not bothered to learn anything about the subject. There's a far greater danger from thunderstorms, to give but one every-day example; but because they are not "new and exciting", people don't foul their trousers at the thought of them.

[TheAnimus]

There's a far greater danger from thunderstorms

Or pissed of ground staff, or drunk pilots, or air france's maintenance and upgrade budget.

[santa claus]

Governments of several countries closed their airspace on the basis of safety whilst airline managers were prepared to put lives at unknown risk rather than jeopardise their profits.

The former are an awful lot of clever people who had not bothered to learn anything about airliners flying in the 'perfectly clear' skies and the latter are motivated by you-know-what.

I, for one, would prefer not to be part of an experiment in collecting data just so wee Willy and his mates get their money. The volcano is an act of God alright: pay your staff what they are worth Willy or it'll be locusts next time .

[Kata]

The airline owners flew their aircraft, and determined there was no risk...and the governments then agreed... since flights restarted, there have been zero ash-related incidents. I can't really see where the airlines are putting people in danger, perhaps you could give some examples?

I think that it's very obvious that airlines are hugely safety motivated (and all professional pilot training, for one, puts safety as top priority; if the Pilot in Command thinks its unsafe to fly, then the company cannot legally force them to, and indeed cannot legally offer any repurcussions.) If there was any ash-related accident, the reputation impact would likely be un-recoverable; the airline management know this, and are probably even more worried about safety than the governments. If the governments cared about safety they'd tackle things like driver training, with the potential to save far more lives; all they are worried about is votes.

[TheAnimus]

oh dear, here we go again, lets try and put some logic in these things shall we.

Airlines want to fly, but, and this is a big one, they don't want to be the first one to have a plane drop out of the sky, least of all over their home turf.

As such most of the airlines are happy to let the 'other one' figure out its safe to fly, fly first and have their company go bankrupt.

Mr Walsh put no passengers at risk, asked nothing of the volunteer staff that he wasn't willing to do himself.

The governmental influences just did nothing, not a thing, complete stagnant inaction.

But as for this been Walsh's punishment for not paying his staff correctly, you could be on to something there, all the staff who have been over paid and under worked compared to the rest of the sector such as Virgin, should have to give back all of their money to BA, and do some work for free or else god might be very angry indeed!

[peterb]

There was an interestin interview on R$ last night, where one of the engineers from (I think) Rolls Royce stated that the safety case for the engines was predicated on not flying within 100 miles of a volcanic plume - purely because there was insufficient data. One of the outcomes of this event is that there is more data on which to revise the safety case, and he acknowledged that that was inspite of data gathered on gas turbines operating in dusty and sandy conditions.

I don't know if the airborbne debris from this eruption is finer or more abrasive than sand or other particulates. However the operational life (and servicing interval) of engines operating in adverse conditions (such as deserts) is reduced - and it seems intutive to me that operating in such conditions will increase damage (wear) to fine toerance components. Flying through this volcanic plume may induce additional wear that could have lead to premature failure later on in the normal service interval of the engine, so banning passenger carrying flights seems to me to be a sensible precaution, while data was gathered.

[Kata]

The question is, what is the "plume". In most places, it is taken as being the visible column and trail of ash downwind. The European governments took it as being every possible bit of airspace that might have some ash in; therein lies the problem. It's good to see that common sense, led by the airlines, has prevailed.

[Terbinator]

The question is, what is the "plume". In most places, it is taken as being the visible column and trail of ash downwind. The European governments took it as being every possible bit of airspace that might have some ash in; therein lies the problem. It's good to see that common sense, led by the airlines, has prevailed.

Are you a banker by any chance ?