From the world of Business Continuity and Crisis Management ....
Sometimes you cannot prepare for every eventuality .....
The last notable occasion when ash from an Icelandic volcano reached the UK was 1783 following a major eruption of volcano Laki. The cloud of ash lay across Europe from the summer of that year and into 1784. Professor Bill McGuire, professor at the Aon Benfield UCL Hazard Research Centre, said: “The [Laki] cloud resulted in elevated summer temperatures and resulted in poor air quality that caused a significant increase in mortality in the UK and elsewhere in Europe.”
In relation to the current eruption, he continued, it is worth noting that the last eruption of Eyjafjöll lasted more than 12 months. If this eruption has a similar duration then ash could periodically present a problem in UK air space.
The 1600m high Eyjafjöll volcano (also known as Eyjafjallajökull) is located in southern Iceland, immediately west of Katla volcano. Eyjafjöll is an elongated, ice-covered volcano topped by a 2.5 km wide summit caldera. The volcano appears to have been relatively inactive over the last 10,000 years, and the sole historical eruption, prior to this year, occurred in 1821.
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