Catania Airport Reopens After Etna Ash, as Sicily Counts the Cost of a Restless Season

Catania's Fontanarossa airport reopened on Tuesday evening after suspending flights for two days because of a volcanic eruption at Mount Etna that threw ash into the sky, The Local Italy reported. The airport is the busiest gateway to eastern Sicily and the closest international terminal to the volcano, and its runways sit within reach of the fall-out from almost every paroxysm at the summit.

The suspension was the latest in a pattern that has become routine for travellers and carriers using the airport. When ash drifts toward the coast, air traffic controllers cannot guarantee the visibility and engine safety that civil aviation rules require, and flights are halted, diverted or cancelled within hours. The Local Italy gave no figure for the number of passengers affected or the number of flights cancelled, and no airline has been named in the report.

For Sicilians the disruption is measured in more than missed connections. The island's tourist economy leans heavily on Catania as its air gateway, and a two-day closure in September falls in a month that still carries late-season arrivals. The reopening on Tuesday evening restores the link, but the underlying condition — an active volcano immediately beside a major airport — is permanent.