Flights Resume to Bali After a Huge Volcanic Ash Cloud

Thousands of Australian and International flights continue to be stranded in Bali or canceled after a Volcanic eruption generated a dangerous ash cloud near the island. The incidents have expelled ash clouds as high as 10km and forced thousands to evacuate. 

Jetstar and Qantas officials issued a statement saying they had stopped flights to Bali for safety reasons due to Volcanic ash. Flight tracking websites like Flighttradar24 showed Flights to Bali by AirAsia and Virgin were also canceled. Besides that, Singapore Airlines said it had canceled a flight on Wednesday from Bali to Singapore because of the eruption.  

Bali is one of the popular tourist destinations, especially among Australian travelers.

A local Airport spokesperson states that all flights to and from the island of Lombok in the West Nusa Tenggara province, another popular tourist destination were also canceled on Wednesday after a harmful ash cloud caused by the Volcanic Eruption.

Therefore, the First eruption of Mount Lewtobbi Laki Laki on Nov 3 in the East Nusa Tenggara province, about 800 km (497 miles) from Bali, killed almost nine people. Till then, it has erupted repeatedly, including various times on Tuesday. From Nov 4 to Nov 12, nearly 80 flights got canceled in Bali from various destinations like Singapore, Hong Kong, and several Australian cities, said Ahmad Syaughi Shahab, general manager of Bali's Ngurah Rai Airport. 

Airlines have resumed Flights:

On Thursday morning, Qantas and Jetstar resumed some flights between Bali and Australia; besides that, Virgin was flying all scheduled flights. Earlier, all three Airlines had canceled their flights to and from Bali due to the harmlessness of the Cloud Ash, which expelled about 9km into the Air. 

Even though some passengers made efforts to switch flights to Garuda, Indonesia, which was still flying. 

Qantas said in a press statement that conditions had improved enough to resume Jetstar and Qantas flights between Australia and Denpasar. In addition, officials said, "We will continue to monitor the changing conditions and volcanic activities and work on a plan to operate more recovering flights." We are contacting customers directly to notify them about any changes to their travel plans. However, we appreciate that the changing situation is frustrating, and we thank customers for their understanding and Patience. 

On Thursday, a Virgin Airlines spokesperson said it was resuming all scheduled flights in and out of Denpasar. We will continue to contact guests whose flights have been canceled to accommodate them on recovery flights in the coming days. 

Airlines that have not yet started flying:

AirAsia planned to resume some flights to and from Bali later today, the company said in a statement to AFP. Meanwhile, Singapore Airlines said it has rescheduled flights from Singapore to Bali and Surabaya as well as their return flights due to Lewotobi Laki-Laki's Volcanic eruption activity. 

As of 3 am Thursday, Bali's Airport has recorded another 32 international flight cancellations, general manager Ahmad Syaugi Shahab said. Further, He added, we hope affected airline passengers can resume their travel on Thursday. 

The Airport in the tourist hotspot of Labuan Bajo reopened on Thursday.