Anyone with the opportunity recently to look at the map of Europe showing the air-traffic restrictions, naively believing in a united European bloc, must have had difficulty understanding what was going on. How was it that one country opened up its air space for a fair amount of time, while its neighbours on both sides decided to close theirs in the interests of safety? For example, could it be that the volcanic ash from Iceland that threatened aircraft in Norway and Finland’s airspace, did not affect planes over Sweden on April 17th?   

Air companies sustained heavy losses, as if the effects of the economic difficulties they have been going through weren’t enough. Tourists, business traveller and students were among those seriously affected by the flight ban. But, if it’s a question of safety, if the ash spewed out by the volcano really can bring down planes then there’s no argument. But it seems that this is not the point. If the same danger threatens various countries, and if they are supposed to think en bloc and make unilateral announcements, how can their differing governmental positions be justified?

Today, the issue is the volcano and air traffic. Tomorrow it could be the economic bail-out for Greece or one of the other PIIGS countries – that group of European nations whose economy is in crisis or on the way to being so. Or it could be the reaction to a natural disaster at sea, or a terrorist threat to land transport.

If the Icelandic economy, bankrupted by the Wall Street crisis –  and, by the way, the poor bankers came out of this even richer, according to the latest figures published on the world’s billionaires – revealed the stage that lack of foresight and control on financial dealings have reached, then the Icelandic volcano with the unpronounceable name teaches us, for its part, about the lack of control that isolated countries and politico-economic blocs have over situations in which it is necessary to act quickly in a coordinated way.

The fact is that chaos takes over and there is no contingency plan or protection network to enter into action in a truly coordinated and efficient way. And it’s worth observing that it is exactly during the first moments of any crisis that you will find the highest number of victims, not of the crisis itself, but of the consequences of a lack of a rapid response plan.    

Planes have emergency exits, life-jackets and rigorous safety procedures that passengers and crew alike must follow. In airports even medication is confiscated if a passenger doesn’t have the prescription to hand – all in the name of safety. Now, when the question is air traffic itself, in a situation that could occur in any place with active volcanoes, we discover governments were wondering what to do for days, and each one made decisions on their own, showing that they had not premeditated the necessary actions, or at least defined the parameters for action.

As the volcano covers European planning with a blanket of ash, Greece – full member of the European Union and part of the euro zone – is drowning in the glowing lava of economic crisis, threatening to drag another four European countries down with it. As this new chaos is being established, the European parliament ponders, the other countries study the issue, and all this lack of action ends up contaminating the other countries united by the single currency...