Volcanic ash: Brown abandons the one million Britons stranded

As experts warned the impact of the volcano could last for months, there were calls for Cobra, the Government’s emergency response unit, to swing into action to co-ordinate a rescue. But a million British Easter holidaymakers face another night away from home.

British airspace was expected to remain closed this morning as scientists warned there was no end in sight to the disruption caused by the giant dust cloud, which contains glass, sand and rock particles that could stall a jet’s engines.

The impact on travellers was unprecedented as they either bedded down in airport lounges or ditched useless plane tickets and tried to get home by road or rail.

Last night the Foreign Office said it was offering consular assistance to anyone who needs it but admitted it had no way of assessing the scale of the difficulties faced by Britons abroad. As the three main party leaders maintained a stony silence on the crisis, former Cobra member Colonel Richard Kemp said: “It’s exactly the sort of situation that Cobra can be called for.

“If it hasn’t been by now, unless there’s a major change, it probably won’t be. But Cobra is there exactly to coordinate civil contingencies for getting back Britons stranded abroad.”

It emerged last night that the Scottish equivalent of Cobra, the Scottish Government Resilience Cabinet sub-committee, did meet yesterday to address the crisis.

But Gordon Brown, who was campaigning in Bedfordshire yesterday, completely failed to consider the plight of the stranded travellers.

The true impact of the crisis caused by the eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano will not be felt until tomorrow morning when schools reopen after the Easter break. Companies will also find many employees absent because hundreds of thousands of families are stuck abroad.

Economists last night expressed fears that Britain’s biggest airport crisis since 9/11 could stall the country’s recovery from recession.

A decision on whether to reopen UK airspace was expected to be made by air traffic controllers at 7am today. But with many countries in Europe grounding their planes, the disruption is expected to last well into next week.

Travellers in Spain have been told they face delays for up to 10 days as airports across the country remain closed, leaving holidaymakers in tears and with no-where to spend the night. Around 30,000 Britons are thought to have been left stranded on the Canary Islands alone.

Forecasters say there is no imminent change in the wind direction to blow the ash cloud away from Britain and large swathes of northern Europe.

Icelandic scientists warned yesterday that volcanic activity had increased and showed no sign of abating. Geologist Magnus Tumi Gudmundsson said: “It’s the magma mixing with the water of the glacier that creates the explosivity. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight.”

Dr Dougal Jerram, of Durham University’s Department of Earth Sciences, said it was hard to know when it would stop erupting. “We know when things are going to happen, what is difficult to predict or understand is how long a volcanic eruption is going to go on for. Some are relatively short-lived, but some are months long.”

Yesterday frustration turned to rage as airlines left many passengers to fend for themselves and make their own way home. Ferries between Calais and Dover were packed as were Eurostar services between Paris and London. But many hadn’t made it that far last night. The Cutler family, from Dronfield in Derbyshire, were stuck in Paris, facing hotel bills of up to £250 a night and with “no idea” how they were going to get home.

“We really don’t know what we’re going to do,” said Simon Cutler, who works as a paramedic in Sheffield. Both he and his wife Irene, a bank manager, were expected back at work tomorrow morning, and their two daughters – Abigail, 14, and Lauren, 10 – were due back at school.

Their BMI flight to East Midlands airport in Leicestershire had been cancelled along with all other flights from Charles de Gaulle airport.

“We were in Paris on a city break,” said Mr Cutler. “There’s no hope of our flight leaving and the Eurostar trains are ­completely sold out. We haven’t got a chance.” Retired window fitter Trevor Jackson, 66, and his wife Liz, a 58-year-old primary school teacher, flew into Zurich from Dubai last Thursday to discover their connecting Swiss Air flight to London was grounded.

Mr Jackson, from Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, told the Sunday Express at Zurich airport: “Swiss Air paid for us to spend two nights in local hotels but then they decided that was that and they weren’t prepared to spend any more. They gave us a voucher to cover a train ticket to Basel on the border with France but after that we were told we had to pay our own way.”

The couple decided to get the train from Zurich to Paris and then try to make their way from Paris to Calais and board a ferry to Dover.

As Britons abroad faced chaos the UK’s airports were eerily silent.

British Airways said all short-haul flights to and from Heathrow and Gatwick airports today have been cancelled. The airline is currently monitoring the situation for long-haul flights.

There were accusations of profiteering last night by hotels and car hire firms.

Sharyn and Roy Collins, from Newcastle upon Tyne, were forced to stay at the Gatwick Marriott Hotel with their daughter Charlotte, 11, when their flight to Jamaica was grounded.

After paying £59 for their first night, they were horrified to be told the next night would cost an extra £100. Mrs Collins, 58, said: “It’s sheer greed. No one is helping the people who have been stranded. I’ve seen couples with babies being offered no help whatsoever.

“If this was wartime, people would be bending over backwards to help each other. What’s happened to the great British Blitz spirit?”

That spirit was in evidence on a train from Dijon to Paris when a group of six Britons battling to get home opened bottles of wine and toasted the Queen. All Eurostar’s services were fully booked this weekend, with more than 46,000 passengers on its trains.

The company denied charges of profiteering after customers found they could not book £58 tickets online. When they phoned to book, they were told the tickets were no longer available. Instead they were charged more than £200.

Many turned to the ferries to reach the Continent. P&O said it was unable to accept any further foot passenger bookings before Monday as a result of the unprecedented surge in demand.

Coach company Eurolines increased its services, while minicab company Addison Lee received requests for journeys to cities as far away as Paris, Milan, Amsterdam and Zurich. A desperate group of businessmen forked out £1,200 for a 700-mile taxi ride from Northampton to Switzerland to beat the airport chaos after their flight to Geneva was cancelled.

A businessman stranded in France was forced to buy a woman’s bicycle to board a ferry in a bid to get home for his wife’s birthday.

Tom Noble, 52, from Highgate in north London, said ferry operator Norfolkline had no foot passenger tickets left and would only allow him to make the journey if he was a cyclist. It wasn’t just ordinary members of the public who were affected. Monty Python star John Cleese returned on Eurostar to Kings Cross St Pancras yesterday, fuming after having had to fork out £3,300 on a taxi from Oslo to Brussels. “I didn’t have any choice,” he said. “I have an important meeting on Monday.”

Queen Margrethe II of Denmark found her 70th birthday celebrations missing key guests after Prince Philip and the King and Queen of Spain were forced to cancel. Last night the Duchess of Cornwall remained stranded in Scotland while there were doubts whether Prince Charles and other world leaders including Barack Obama would make today’s funeral of Polish president Lech Kaczynski, who died in a plane crash last Saturday.

Fears that the crisis could slow the economic recovery grew after the accountants KPMG estimated the cost to airlines alone is racking up at £200million a day. More than 500,000 passengers a day normally fly in and out of the UK on around 5,300 flights. Airline stocks tumbled on Friday as the cost from extra delays and hotel bills looked likely to top £1billion. While airlines are re-booking and refunding customers, critics accused insurance firms of dragging their feet in deciding whether to compensate travellers or invoke catch-all “Act of God” clauses to escape having to pay out.

Meanwhile, shoppers were warned to expect food shortages in supermarkets next week as the delays start to affect the import of air-freighted food. Firms spec­ialising in flying in produce from overseas warned of higher prices.

It said that while there are enough products in warehouses to see stores through the weekend, supermarkets will be severely affected next week.

Scientists said traces of volcanic dust had been found in Sunderland, Sheffield, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Lerwick. Sales of gas masks rose after the World Health Organisation warned people to stay indoors. A spokesman said the microscopic ash was potentially dangerous because inhaled particles can reach the lungs and cause breathing problems.

Additional reporting by Natalie Chalk, Kirsty Buchanan and Ted Jeory.