The expression "safety is our top priority" is used so often it has lost its power to inform.
But the aviation authorities over Europe last week were telling the truth when they said safety was their top priority. They were right to ground aviation given their knowledge of the intensity of the volcanic ash over most of the continent. It is their job to protect air travellers from unacceptable risk, because airlines can be influenced by commercial considerations.
The risk was there. It was visible as a massive cloud above the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland, and within a day of the eruption Finnish air force Boeing F-18s had suffered severe damage to their engines. Within minutes of the skies over the UK being cleared for operation, three airliners landing at Heathrow from transatlantic flights had reported sulphurous smells in the aircraft. Since that time there have been eight more reports of "ash" smells in aircraft operating in British airspace, several sightings by pilots of visible ash layers and, towards the end of the week, RAF Eurofighter Typhoons had been grounded following the detection of ash damage to their engines. This risk was not a figment of the authorities' imagination.
Europe's aviation authorities may now have put figures on a level of acceptable low density atmospheric ash, where before the rule was zero, but an "acceptable" risk remains a risk, and the regulation does not represent an ideal, but a minimum legal level of safety. Airlines and other operators should also carry out their own risk assessments. In fact in the UK they have been told that they must, and they definitely will. One assessment they will have to make is the cost of cumulative damage to engines exposed to low intensity ash. If an engine loses even 1% in fuel efficiency, the airline will shoulder increased fuel costs for the remaining life of the engine or have to pay big bucks to replace it. To paraphrase the English aphorism about marriage, if the airlines got airborne in haste, they could end up repenting at leisure.
One bit of air transport buccaneering that the UK tabloid press absolutely loved was British Airways' chief Willie Walsh's brinkmanship in launching flights from North America to the UK before he knew whether they would be allowed to land. He got away with it. But that is why regulators, dull or not, are required. Getting away with it is not the way to run an airline, Willie. It was your pilots that reported the sulphur smells on landing. That's a close call.
Source: Flight International
