Mexico volcano ash disrupts US flights for second straight day
Source: AFP |
July 7, 2013, Sunday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
FRUSTRATED passengers stood in long lines at Mexico City's airport on Friday as United States airlines canceled flights for a second day after the Popocatepetl volcano spewed a new column of ash.
United Airlines, Delta Airlines, Alaska Airlines and AirTran voluntarily scrapped 15 flights as a precaution, but the airport did not restrict travel as it did not consider the ash a risk, airport spokesman Jorge Andres Gomez said.
On Thursday, six US airlines had canceled some 60 flights, stranding 600 passengers, with many of them still looking for a way out of the Mexican capital on Friday afternoon.
"They can't even give us chairs," Mexican traveler Gabriela Garcia said as she stood in a long line at a Delta counter with some 200 other people. "Nobody knows anything, nobody says anything, we've been standing for six hours."
Another Mexican traveler, Eusebio Pacheco, said that he had also been waiting in line for six hours with his wife, hoping to finally take off to the Canadian province of Quebec. "We don't know anything, they don't tell us anything, we're desperate," he said, adding that two flights were canceled. They hoped to fly out yesterday.
The airport spokesman said operations were getting back to normal and that flights from Europe and other regions had been landing all day.
The National Disaster Prevention Center had reported early on Friday the 5,452-meter high volcano had blown a 1.5-kilometer high column of ash that was heading west-northwest and produced low-intensity tremors.
United Airlines, Delta Airlines, Alaska Airlines and AirTran voluntarily scrapped 15 flights as a precaution, but the airport did not restrict travel as it did not consider the ash a risk, airport spokesman Jorge Andres Gomez said.
On Thursday, six US airlines had canceled some 60 flights, stranding 600 passengers, with many of them still looking for a way out of the Mexican capital on Friday afternoon.
"They can't even give us chairs," Mexican traveler Gabriela Garcia said as she stood in a long line at a Delta counter with some 200 other people. "Nobody knows anything, nobody says anything, we've been standing for six hours."
Another Mexican traveler, Eusebio Pacheco, said that he had also been waiting in line for six hours with his wife, hoping to finally take off to the Canadian province of Quebec. "We don't know anything, they don't tell us anything, we're desperate," he said, adding that two flights were canceled. They hoped to fly out yesterday.
The airport spokesman said operations were getting back to normal and that flights from Europe and other regions had been landing all day.
The National Disaster Prevention Center had reported early on Friday the 5,452-meter high volcano had blown a 1.5-kilometer high column of ash that was heading west-northwest and produced low-intensity tremors.
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