A volcano erupts in Iceland, the sinister cloud drifts our way and within hours, every airport in the land is either closed or in chaos.

People are stranded, appointments are cancelled, holidays are at risk and getting in and out of Britain by air becomes impossible.

A dire and desperate situation?

Hardly. Just thank the Lord for volcanologists and other experts who swiftly spot the danger if volcanic ash should be sucked into planes and bring some of them (and a few thousand travellers) down.

Yet people being interviewed were saying things like ‘this holiday had been booked for 18 months now we can’t fly today. Typical’, ‘two little girls were excitedly waiting for their daddy to come home after three weeks, now they are bitterly disappointed’, ‘Unless I get back, I’ll miss my birthday on Saturday’, and  ‘I’m getting married and my family were supposed to fly from Ireland, what do they do now?’

All situations which frustrate and some causing more concern than others, but what on earth is wrong with these people?

If the holidaymakers, the returning daddy, the birthday boy or the wedding family were brought down through damaged planes, what would the reaction be then?

People really are extraordinary. Sometimes we might be over-cautious. But most of us, given such an unprecedented happening over our country in our lifetime, would settle for caution before gung-ho pilots taking our lives in their hands.

The only groups you might have hoped would go were drunken stag parties screaming ‘I hate Iceland.’

Good old human race!

By Shirley Tart