Volcanic ash brings travel misery to West Midlands
STRANDED airplane passengers and disrupted businesses this week made the best of trying circumstances caused by the eruption of the Icelandic volcano.
A ban on flights, which affected 23 countries in the European Union and was continually extended, caused travel disruption across the globe and left travel plans in tatters.
However, not all Midlands entrepreneurs were suffering.
Elizabeth Lewis-Jones, Managing Director of Liquid PR, flew to Dubai prior to the ash crisis to meet a client and was unable to return.
Nevertheless, she said it was ‘business as usual’ for her company, albeit with some additional sunshine.
“I’m in very sunny Dubai – sun streaming through the window – so being stuck here isn’t all bad news,” she said.
“There is little we can do about the situation until flying resumes, so I’m making the most of it and have been exploring new business opportunities in the city.
“Already I’ve set up some key meetings with marketing managers, the PR association in the Middle East and with journalists.”
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Tracey Stephenson, Managing Director of serviced apartments company Staying Cool, was both stuck abroad and had clients with nowhere to go.
She was in the west of France after a few days skiing with her daughters and was due to fly home on Saturday.
Speaking earlier in the week, she said: “We were due to fly back on Saturday but they kept extending the ban. We have now booked onto Eurostar but we aren’t sure if we can get to Paris as the French railways have just gone on strike.”
Staying Cool was also left with a party of Dutch clients who had hired rooms from it in the Rotunda, Birmingham, but who couldn’t fly home.
“We ended up providing them with camp beds and they stayed in the Rotunda overnight while they sorted things out. They are on their way back to the Netherlands by ferry now.”
The first major event to suffer disruption was the European Gymnastics Championships at the National Indoor Arena (NIA), which was started on Wednesday.
It eventually got under way today with organisers praising the ‘Dunkirk spirit’ of competitors who found various ways of getting across the continent in order to compete.
Flights at Birmingham International Airport were slowly getting back to normal today but a number of services were still either cancelled or pushed back, with the airport still advising passengers to check with their airlines prior to travelling.
