“We sent ten Boeing 747 and Airbus 340 jets on transfer flights from Munich to Frankfurt,” Lufthansa spokesman Klaus Walther told the paper. The planes were moved in order to be in the most useful place once the ban is lifted, he explained.
“Our machines flew to a height of 24,000 feet, or around 8,000 metres. In Frankfurt the machines were examined by our technicians. They didn’t find the slightest scratch on the cockpit windscreens, on the outer skin nor in the engines.”
“The flight ban, which is completely based on computer calculations, is causing economic damage in the billions. This is why, for the future, we demand that dependable measurements must be available before a flight ban is imposed.”
Source: “the Local”
At left: the model from the Met Office used to look at dispersion.
The Nuclear Accident Model (NAME) was originally developed after the nuclear accident in 1986 at Chernobyl, which highlighted the need for a capability to predict the spread and deposition of radioactive material released into the atmosphere. The model has continued to be developed and is now applied to a wide range of atmospheric pollution problems, ranging from emergency responses to daily air-quality forecasts.
Over the years, NAME has been applied to a number of atmospheric releases, including radioactive releases, the Kuwaiti oil fires, major industrial fires and chemical spills, and two major volcanic eruptions that occurred in Iceland. Both of these eruptions resulted in aircraft having to be re-routed to avoid potentially dangerous ash clouds. An example of the volcanic ash guidance provided to the aviation community is shown in Figure 1.
Source: NWP Gazette
Here is what Professor Jerom Ravetz of Oxford has to say about the issue (via email):
Interim contribution to the Post-Normal Science debate.
Considering the effects of the Icelandic volcano on air transport, we seem to have:
- Facts Uncertain: how thin must the dust be, for it to be safe enough for flying?
- Values in Dispute: Regulators wanting safety at all costs, others needing to get flying now.
- Stakes High: Crippling costs to industry, versus big risks to aircraft and people.
- Decisions Urgent: Every day the immediate costs mount, and the long-term costs grow.
Is this analysis an invitation to scientists to cheat? Some of my critics would say so, and perhaps even some of my supporters as well!
h/t to WUWT readers Nigel Brereton and Bernd Felsche
Is this analysis an invitation to scientists to cheat?
This question is lost in translation to me: How would this be a chance to cheat? Cheat what? Tweak the results instead of releasing the actual model output?
I fail to see what this has to do with post-normal science. It seems to be a problem of models versus the real world and preliminary reports indicate the models are wrong.
So what is the incentive to cheat here? Some scientist might change the data for the actual results in order to cover up the failure of the model?
Jon (08:55:41) :
“@ScientistForTruth (08:05:13) :
I suggest you leave the job of aircraft safety with those who know what they are talking about!!!”
Oh yes, I forgot – the tyranny of the experts.
Dr Ravetz
“…safety at all costs”
That is your problem right there, Dr Ravetz.
The warmist safetey elves simultaneously criticize the skeptics for demanding what they characterize as an unprecedented level of scientific certainty, all at the same time supporting drastic and draconian measures on the flimsiest of pretexts.
Self justification
Now they can write a computer model. input the number of flights multiplied by the millions of dollars of settlement claims for deaths and let us know they saved us 1.654 trillion dollars by reason of avoiding crashes from jet engine failures. Are there any unemployed anatomy retentive model programmers around?
Who predicted this event? Whcih model? I have read that CO2 is the sole source of all inconvenient events.
Here in Norway the flight ban has actually taken life. Even ambulance helicopters are grounded due to ash clouds, which means that people in rural areas dont get to hospital in time for treatment.
Is it even a danger for helicopters to fly through a thin ash cloud??
Britain’s flight ban to be LIFTED tomorrow (but now the battle begins to clear the massive backlog)
Show is over, time to go home…
Surely this will give the Poley bears in Canadia grey hair.
(I get credit for being the first to predict)
My experiment is performed under controlled conditions. I use a white cat and poof a little ash from the fireplace on the cat.
stevengoddard (08:25:20) :
“The computer simulations are the best tool available.”
You are plain wrong!.
Observations are the best tool available!
After eruption starts and you initially shout down the flights, then you soon start with “old style” observations.
Some burocrats decided that after an eruption, all decisions came from a stupid model. No one thought to put some efforts also in measuring and observing an eventual ash cloud. A lot of money bonus in order to not take a decision!
This is Stephen Schneider’s much vaunted Precautionary Principle on display in all of it’s ugly, twisted, dehumanizing, civilization-crushing glory. Hundreds of millions of dollars wasted each day as tens of thousands of people are left stranded at airports across Europe — and for what? As a “precaution” to protect them against a simulated danger that exists primarily in a computer generated fantasy world. Certainly there is a physical risk that exists in the real world as a result of the volcanic plume from Iceland; but the severity and extent of that risk has yet to be quantified on a continental-wide basis. It’s time to dump the post-normal pseudo-science of Schneider et al and get back to real science.
For all those who say “better safe than sorry”, I say let the airlines run their tests and then give people the option to fly based on the results of those tests. Make it known to the flight crews and the passengers what the results are and what the possible risks are and then let them decide whether or not the uncertainties are acceptable to their own interests. These are adults. Let them make informed decisions and act based on their own tolerance of risk instead of relying on nanny-state bureaucrats with computer models to protect everyone from every possible hazard (whether real, imagined or simulated).
If the airlines and passengers were free to make informed decisions based on the best available information that’s backed by real world, physical data, I’d bet that those planes would all go out full and, furthermore, that they’d all arrive safely at their destinations.
On BBC World news tonight, the airline representatives are pleading with Met Office and Eurocontrol to rely less on their weather models and to use actual measurements, as the airlines are doing with their test flights.
Mr Bisignani, of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), said
“The decision that Europe has made is with no risk assessment, no consultation, no co-ordination, no leadership,”
I don’t know who is right, but it sounds just like Europe’s stance Climate Change.
RajKapoor (08:20:17) :
Is this for real? If so, it’s like something straight out of Michael Crichton’s ‘Climate of Fear’.
RajKapoor (08:20:17) : UNBELIEVABLE! PRO-GW GEOENGINEERING:
“The whole point was to help kill the airline industry and prove that global warming was in part due to aircraft emissions,” Schnellerflugzoeg said. “With aviation grounded, scientists would be able to gather evidence of a drop in mean temperatures and doctor the figures, showing perhaps as much as a 2 degrees centigrade drop.”
It is not so much the danger, but rather the expense. Ash significantly reduces engine life. These are the most expensive engines on Earth. As for helicopters, not only is engine life reduced, but also that of the innumerable other moving parts.
John Blake – try hitting a balloon with a tennis racket – that is a pretty good description of what it will do (my first year mechanics lecturer introduced us to that “Aristotelian Cannon”). Friction is considered the dominant factor in Aristotelian mechanics, whereas momentum dominates in Newtonian mechanics. Use heavy steel balls in air, and the Newtonian model is the best description. Use barely-denser-than-water projectiles underwater, and you will find that the Aristotelian model works better. It is all about understanding the assumptions and constraints of the model.
If we lived in a world dominated by positive feedbacks, the concerns about a climate “tipping point” would be rational. We don’t appear to live in such a world, in fact, our world seems to be dominated by negative feedback – to the extent that the net climate effect of increasing CO2 concentrations appears to be unmeasurable.
1] Facts not Uncertain: the alleged cure to the alleged CO2AGW disease induces disasterous consequences as demonstrated by the very existence of the underdeveloped countries as well as by the effects of the biofuel programs. China and India have apparently made this calculation and have decided strongly against the CO2CAGW “precautions”, at the least. Russia apparently doesn’t believe anything about the alleged mechanism. CO2 has not been known or shown to be a significant cause of GW, ever. Even the alleged Heat in CO2AGW mechanism has been “lost”. Ipcc Post Normal Climate Science has eschewed the Scientific Method and has thus not done what the people of the World trusted it to be doing, including me. Etc., etc.
2] Values not in Dispute: see above, unless you happen to be a PNS, Communist, World Government controllist or a useless idiot “save-the-worlder”, or perhaps some other transient beneficiary of this kind of truely enslaving, obviously deranged controllism, which has never worked towards the benefit of Humankind, ever.
3] Stakes High: see both above.
4] Decisions not Urgent: see all above. Panic is unwarranted and contravenes the use of both the Scientific Method and Rationality. Instead calm decisions based upon efficiency, rational use of resources, the rational development of new energy sources and the extention of Nuclear Energy use, as per France, and rational moves to address real pollution and other real environmental threats are indicated, critically involving the use of the Scientific Method!
Dr. Ravetz, having eschewed the Scientific Method and Rationality as being relevant to the benefit of Humankind and the World, what’s next?
Jimmy Haigh (09:37:13) : Your comment is awaiting moderation
RajKapoor (08:20:17) :
Dohh!!!!! Can’t believe I even thought it was serious even for a minute! Verloke Shomes indeed. I’ve been offshore for too long – I need a beer.
“Britain’s flight ban to be LIFTED tomorrow ”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1267257/Iceland-volcano-eruption-UK-flight-ban-LIFTED-tomorrow.html
Controlled by a computer program that cannot think for itself.
No doubt, the computer projects a trend based upon the initial data, and since it receives little additional data, it therefore goes off into trend land.
All too familiar.
ScientistForTruth:
Our ability to measure things far outweighs our ability to determine the significance of the measurement.
I agree that we must know at what levels ash are actually significant, but not just to engines but to all flight system (especially sensors).
As a follow-on from that, we must be able to survey and measure what’s in the airspace. Then feed that data into systems to provide a risk assessment with 3-dimensional “threat envelopes” as used in military operations available for flight planners on a “real-time” basis.
In areas where there are lots of aircraft, real-time information can probably be gathered by the airliners themselves and fed into the assessment analysis to augment what would be routinely collected by ground-based monitoring and aerial surveys.
Manufacturers of engines and aircraft can, through testing, observe the behaviour of exposure to ash, and recommend operating cycles to minimise damage if exposure is inevitable. Such procedures *might* be to deliberately shut down individual engines in recovered flight to thermally shock any fused deposits from turbine blades, combustion chambers and injectors.
Ancient, bureaucratic planning processes must be overhauled. Flexibility to divert air traffic so that passengers and cargo can detour efficiently around an actual problem area, to save the passenger’s time, to try to get the cargo to destination as quickly as possible, even if a little late.
e.g. My sister is “stuck” in Vancouver, trying to fly to Milan but her airline wants to take her via Frankfurt, which is closed. Oslo is open. So is Milan a lot of the time it appears. There are flights from Oslo to Milan. None direct from Vancouver to Oslo. Because of a bureaucracy.
Little planning flexibility on the part of the airlines.
pat:
Watch your hyperbole.
If aircraft were made from “innumerable other moving parts”, they couldn’t fly, mainly because they couldn’t ever be built. 🙂
This post deserves a separate post >>>>>RajKapoor (08:20:17) :
It is BIG NEWS
So what if the eruption goes on for a year?
What is the actual risk? Possibly some slight damage to the engine, or a danger of engine failure? Could short haul flights continue if they fly below a certain level? Could long haul flights continue if they can fly above a certain level? At some time there has to be a proper risk assesment. Zero tolerance is not really acceptable.
I keep of thinking of Health and Safety officials. Initially they would work to minimise accidents, then to try and eliminate all possible acidents, and then to avoid theoretically possible accidents!
RajKapoor (08:20:17), is that chain of emails real or someone’s idea of a joke (hoax)?
stevengoddard (08:25:20) :
Challenger O-Rings worked fine, until they didn’t. The computer simulations are the best tool available.>>
Challenger O-Rings worked fine until they were used outside of their designed temperature range and against the recommendations (protests in fact) of the engineers who designed them. This is PNS in action. The pressure to launch the shuttle was urgent. The political stakes were high. The facts were in dispute. And so some moronic officials put the actual science aside in favour of the political answers that were convenient, and killed a bunch of astronaughts.
” * Facts Uncertain: how thin must the dust be, for it to be safe enough for flying?
* Values in Dispute: Regulators wanting safety at all costs, others needing to get flying now.
* Stakes High: Crippling costs to industry, versus big risks to aircraft and people.
* Decisions Urgent: Every day the immediate costs mount, and the long-term costs grow.”
Once again this isn’t about science but is a decision making methodology.