The eruption of a Russian volcano is causing quite some issues for airlines this week. The problems apply to many transpacific flights, even those that avoid Russian airspace.
Volcano erupts on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula
On Wednesday, November 1, 2023, Eurasia’s tallest active volcano erupted. Specifically, the Klyuchevskaya Sopka volcano is 4,650 meters tall (15,255 feet). This volcano is located on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, in the northern part of the country, near the Bering Sea, which separates Russia and Alaska.
The good news is that this area is sparsely populated (there are two towns not too far away, each with around 5,000 people), and there have been no reports of injuries.
The bad news is that the impact of the volcano goes way beyond the immediate area. As you’d expect, this eruption is causing some major ash clouds, with ash being reported as high as eight miles above sea level, even higher than most commercial aircraft fly.
How the volcano eruption has impacted flights
While many airlines already avoid Russian airspace on transpacific flights (due to flight restrictions in place, plus out of an abundance of caution), the implications of these ash clouds go way beyond that. Long story short, flights that would ordinarily operate near the Bering Sea (staying just south of Russia) are needing to route much further south.
At a minimum, flights are taking materially longer than usual, especially those headed to North Asia (like Japan and South Korea). Just to give an example, let’s look at United’s flight UA131 from Newark (EWR) to Tokyo (HND). On October 31, before the volcano erupted, the flight took 14hr1min.
Then on November 2, the flight took 16hr26min, so that’s a full 2hr25min longer.
And the situation today seems to be even worse, as the plane will make a fuel stop in San Francisco (SFO).
As another example, let’s look at Delta’s flight DL167 from Seattle (SEA) to Tokyo (HND). On October 31, before the volcano erupted, the flight took 9hr59min.
Then on November 2, the flight took 12hr29min, so that’s a full 2hr30min longer.
And the situation today seems to be even worse, as the flight has just been outright canceled.
The trend here is pretty obvious. As the ash keeps getting pushed further out, the operational disruptions are becoming greater. Hopefully this trend reverses soon, but in the meantime, you can expect transpacific flights will take quite a bit longer than before. If you have any tight connections planned, you might want to plan accordingly.
Bottom line
On November 1, one of Russia’s largest volcanoes erupted. In addition to the impact on the immediate area, this is having major implications for transpacific flights, especially those that generally take northerly routings. Flights are currently taking significantly longer across the Pacific than usual. Unfortunately the situation still seems to be getting worse, rather than better.
Have any OMAAT readers been impacted by this volcanic eruption in Russia?
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