Ash cloud causes widespread cancellations across southeast Australia

Qantas, Virgin Australia and Tiger have announced widespread flight cancellations as the ash cloud from Chile’s Cordon Caulle volcano continues to wreak havoc over southern Australia.

Virgin Australia has suspended all services to and from Adelaide and Mildura today, all flights into and out of Canberra from 1pm, and from Sydney and Melbourne from 4pm. Qantas has cancelled all flights to and from Adelaide (all day), Canberra (from 12pm) and Sydney (from 3pm) today. Jetstar has also cancelled Adelaide flights. Tiger, which originally planned to cancel eight flights for today, has now grounded all domestic services until at least 2pm. Meanwhile, Air New Zealand has advised that all of its scheduled domestic and international flights are currently operating as normal.

Airservices Australia has said it is “closely monitoring” the ash cloud with meteorologists, which has “the potential to seriously impact air travel in much of south-east Australia in the next 12-48 hours”. Further flight delays/cancellations to Melbourne and Tasmania in coming days have not been ruled out either.