Volcanic Ash Shuts Down Airports

CNN reports

A cloud of ash from Iceland's Grimsvotn volcano spread toward central Europe late Tuesday, spurring German authorities to announce two airports will close and prompting British airlines to cancel hundreds of flights.

Hamburg International Airport will shut down at 6 a.m. Wednesday (midnight Tuesday ET), while Bremen's airport will close at 5 a.m., Germany's Aviation Safety Agency announced. Berlin's airport could be affected by the falling ash by noon Wednesday, the agency said.

A portion of the ash from Saturday's eruption in Iceland had spread over Britain by Tuesday afternoon, with the cloud reaching London's Heathrow airport -- the world's busiest international air travel hub -- around lunchtime, a computer model indicated. The European air traffic control organization Eurocontrol reported about 500 flights in British airspace were canceled Tuesday, roughly double the number expected earlier in the day.

The ash cloud was projected to cover all of British airspace by early Wednesday morning and will be densest over Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England, according to Britain's weather agency, the Met Office. But British Airways, which sent a test flight into the region Tuesday evening, said it expects service to return to normal by Wednesday.