Euro, Ash Impacts on Italy??!!

[TLCOhio]

If you're heading to Italy next week or soon, here are two recent news events to be watching.

 

Currency Values???: The euro sunk as low at $1.258 yesterday morning. Per the Wall Street Journal, it is now at $1.276. The UK pound is now $1.48. That's much different than when we were in the Baltics in late July 2008 and the euro was about $1.58. The UK pound was near $2 then. Either in 2008 those values were too "high" or the Europe currencies have fallen too much since then.

 

They were closing some airports today in parts of Spain and Portugal. Now it's known that there will be more closings to happen on Sunday. Some flights can fly around the path of these ash patterns. Others can't. It doesn't look like a blanket closing in Europe, but it looks like it will be here and there.

 

From the AP newswire with in the last hour, they have this headline: "Ash delays and reroutes trans-Atlantic flights" with these added details and highlights: "The Icelandic volcano with the unpronounceable name reminded the world again that it has the power to disrupt international travel — coughing out a spreading cloud of ash that delayed or canceled hundreds of flights between Europe and North America on Saturday. The prospects for Sunday flights remained grim, with no improvement in sight for trans-Atlantic passengers, and with a plume of low-altitude ash continuing to float eastward over Spain and southern France. Flights had to be rerouted north over Greenland or south around Spain to avoid the 1,200-mile (2,000-kilometer)-long cloud stretching from Iceland to northern Spain. Approximately 600 airliners make the oceanic crossing every day. Around 40 percent were rerouted southward and the rest skirted Iceland from the north, according to Eurocontrol."

 

See the full story at:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jh7lQ-qBxQMPzPd3Iap7_s3YDBfQD9FIQ3I00

 

THANKS! Terry in Ohio

[TLCOhio]

Has anyone found a good, easy website with a daily list of airport closures in Europe?

 

This question came up on the Spain board. Here are my suggestions if you want to check and get more current info. One option is to use Google.com and then click on their news section. Then search for stories under the title of "Iceland volcano". That will produce a number of stories on that subject. Then you can also hit the button for those that are the most current. It's titled "sort by date".

 

I shared this great website from rsquare with very interesting maps showing the specific locations over the Atlantic and land on the ash at various sky elevations:

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2010/volcano/ashconcentration/

 

From Business Week/Bloomberg News in the last 15 minutes, they have this AP headline: "A glance at flight disruptions due to volcanic ash" with these highlights: "Eurocontrol expects flight disruptions around four points in European airspace on Sunday. An ash cloud lingers over northwest Scotland and a finger stretches into northwest Spain and Portugal. An isolated cloud affects southern France and north Switzerland while another hangs over southern Switzerland, northern Italy, southern Germany, the Czech Republic and Austria." This story goes into specific details at each major airport around Europe.

 

The full story is at:

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9FJ9JSG0.htm

 

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

[mydreamvacation]

Hopefully the ash problem will end soon as we are heading back to Europe this summer. As for the euro if it drops much more we are going to pre buy some and pre pay our hotels last time we were there in 2009 it was 1.51 which is a big savings!

[dougt1957]

You can get up to date ash coverage at radarvirtuel.com. Use safari or firefox browser for the best results. Click on the filter tab and check the volcanic ash layer box and it will show the current position of the cloud. This will give a general idea of the affected airports. Sometimes the press reports are of the sky is falling mentality and somewhat exaggerated as to the severity of the problem.