Are we done for?

[Afterburner]

Volcano spews over Iceland, Europe in partial crisis

Just heard it over the telly-a tremendous amount of daily plane flights have been canceled. The smoke and ash are raping Europe up the dirty road. There is a possibility that this eruption (a rather "peaceful" one) might trigger a worse , bigger volcanic eruption which would have global effects as well as effing up Iceland.

[Karcentric]

It's pretty damn worrying.

[Afterburner]

The news are RAGING over here about that cloud. People with asthma should by no chance go outside.

[jeniskunk]

The news here has been talking about the interruptions to Euro/UK air travel for the past several days, mainly focussing on how travelers have been inconvenienced by it.
Burnzz, got a newslink about the asthma stuff? The BBC newslink in your OP has nothing on that score.

Jenifur Charne

[Afterburner]

The asthma thing was on the telly, with "experts" panting about everyone barricading themselves.

[jeniskunk]

IOW the usual mess-media uninformed panic merchants.
Thanks for that Burnzz

Jenifur Charne

[Basil]

No sign of any world destroying clouds here. A few cancelled flights won't really do much harm.

[Afterburner]

I was out for some time, and, apart from a few dust clouds, nothing happened.

[Carnageman]

Yeah, how the hell are we done for?

[Afterburner]

If that bigass volcano goes boom it could have "catastrophic consequences". The thing is, I didn't feel the catastrophic consequences either and I'm like a smoke detector of some sort.

[jeniskunk]

Because, at the time the news item became a matter of serious concern, there was the possibility of further volcanic eruptions, with no clear picture of the possible full extent of the disruptions to air travel.
Things, however, have settled down again it would seem, as airlines are now running test flights.

Jenifur Charne

[imperialreign]

Although it's not really affecting the US . . . I don't think there's too much to worry about in regards to the volcanic activity - Iceland sits right over some major volcanic hot spots as it is . . .

Besides, there've been other major eruptions in the past that didn't have much of an impact on global weather and such - it really depends on the volcano itself, and where it's located.

IMHO, the media (even here in the US) has really been blowing all the naturally occuring phenomena out of proportion recently (more than likely thanks to the movie 2012).

[Zeno, Lord Camelith]

You've got it easy. You're not sitting ~80 miles away from a major fault line, even though there's hardly ever any earthquakes over here.

[imperialreign]

Not really - there's 7 or 8 "dormant" faults that run through Virginia, and they still occasionally stir things up. They're typically somewhat minor throughout the state (2.0-4.5), but they do carry the potential for some major activity.

For us, though, it's not really a concern most of the time - we're not close to the edge of a tectonic plate (like western US), which creates more localized damage . . . but when a fault here does even a little movement, it can be felt across the whole state . . . in many cases, even hundreds of miles away, with people reporting "feeling" the quake (and instruments recording it, also).

Plus - we also deal with the potential threat of numerous hurricanes and tropical storms every year . . .

No matter where anyone lives, there's always some form of natural weather phenomena that occurs nearby, or has the potential to occur . . . no one is really "safe" from any natural "disaster."

[Διμι]

Well, the potential global implications for an ash cloud of that size (following subsequent eruptions) would certainly affect a whole lot more of the world than say, an earthquake.

But yeah, they made a mistake, blah blah, camelculations...