Airports in Northern Germany and Scandinavia may be forced to close today as a cloud of volcanic ash from Iceland drifts across the North Sea, according to projections from the U.K. Meteorolgy Center.

Airports in Bremen and Hamburg will have to shut down early and Berlin may have closures from early afternoon as volcanic ash moves over northern Germany, the DFS flight security office said last night.  No start and landing permission will be granted to the airport in Bremen from 5am and in Hamburg from 6am, DFS said on its website.

British Airways, Air France-KLM Group & United Continental Holdings were among carriers that scrapped local flights to and from airports yesterday, after ash from the eruption of the Grimsvotn volcano drifted through UK airspace.

According to its website, Air France-KLM canceled 19 flights to and from airports in the UK, Norway, Sweden and Germany today.

Ash from another Icelandic volcano closed European airspace for six days last year, halting 100,000 flights at a cost of $1.7 billion, according to the International Air Transport Association.

While limits on flying have since been loosened, ash densities from the eruption of the volcano on May 21 are such that some areas of airspace were closed.

It is hoped that the volcano will abate sufficiently that Australian flights scheduled to leave from these north European airports will remain unaffected.  With things bad enough in regard to international tourism Australia wont want to face another natural disaster especially one from the other side of the world.

If, as predicted, the volcano quietens down again by the weekend we will have once again 'dodged a bullet' that looked destined for our region.

Passengers were advised that there may also be disruption tomorrow.  DFS declined to give a forecast for the airport in Hanover, which lies on the edge of the contaminated area. It recommended that passengers contact their airline for any cancellations or delays.

About 500 flights of the region’s 29,000 were cancelled yesterday, according to Eurocontrol, which oversees air traffic in Europe. The ash cloud was expected to have reached northern Germany by midnight and may reach Berlin during the day, the German weather service said yesterday.

“We have to consider that it may come to the closure of airspace,” Andrea Bartels, a spokesman for Deutsche Lufthansa AG, said late yesterday. “Our advice for our customers is to make sure that they have checked the status of the flight before they start their trip to the airport.”

Eurocontrol said yesterday that projections from the VAAC in London showed that there is a “strong possibility,” that the ash could affect parts of Denmark, southern Norway and southwest Sweden by today.

British Airways cancelled more than 40 flights at Scottish airports yesterday and said trans-Atlantic services suffered “minor delays” taking longer routes to avoid Iceland.

Continental Airlines scrapped two flights to Edinburgh and one to Glasgow from Newark, New Jersey, and said that with no planes available the return trips were also cancelled.

The UK Civil Aviation Authority has revised its rules to let airlines fly in an ash density of two grams or less per 10 cubic meters of air. They can also operate where the density is two to four grams, provided they have had their safety case for doing so accepted, the CAA says, but flights are still banned at levels above four grams.