The huge ash cloud kept up its regime of chaos over Europe, forcing the cancellation of another 20,000 flights, though experts said the eruption in Iceland was losing power.

But as airlines argued the dangers had been exaggerated, NATO said a build-up of glass has been found in the engine of one of its fighter jets, warning of an impact on military capabilities.

Europe's three main airports in London, Paris and Frankfurt, remained giant ghost towns, ordered to stay closed until at least Tuesday. Some experts said severe disruptions could run several more days.

Britain ordered its navy flagship aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal and HMS Ocean and HMS Albion to pick up thousands of marooned Britons and even troops trying to get back from Afghanistan.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he expected Ocean to be off the French coast -- where many Britons have come from all over Europe -- later Monday while Ark Royal was moving towards the Channel. HMS Albion was heading for northern Spain to pick up the troops and some stranded civilians.

"This is the biggest challenge to our aviation transport network for many years," Brown said.

Spain, one of the rare countries operating normally, said its airports would also be used to repatriate hundreds of thousands of stranded nationals from Britain, France and Germany who are stuck around the world.

As forecasters predicted the ash cloud could soon reach Canada, European transport ministers were to hold a video conference to work out how to get around the chaos sparked by Iceland's Eyjafjoell volcano.

"This is a European embarrassment and it's a European mess," said Giovanni Bisignani, director general of the International Air Transport Association.

Authorities in Sweden, Romania, Croatia, Hungary and the Czech Republic announced the resumption of flights. Other countries such as Switzerland and Denmark allowed jets to fly through their airspace but only above the cloud.

Eurocontrol, a continent-wide aviation authority, said only 8,000-9,000 flights of the normal 28,000 would get into the air, mainly in southern Europe.

Nearly seven million passengers have been affected by the closures which governments say are essential for safety reasons.

Air France, British Airways, KLM and Lufthansa reported no problems after launching flights to test fears that the ash cloud would destroy jet engines.

"We are far enough in this crisis to express our dissatisfaction at how governments have managed the crisis," Bisignani told reporters in Paris.

"Risk assessment should be able to help us to reopen certain corridors, if not the entire airspace."

KLM chairman Peter Hartman reaffirmed a demand that "KLM will get authorisation as quickly as possible to restart a part of its operations and to get passengers to their destination."

Lufthansa's chief executive said computer simulations from the Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre in London, on which an extension to the German shutdown was based, "cannot be taken seriously."

"No one wants to fly into a volcanic ash cloud but what we have seen in the last three days is completely different from something posing a danger," Wolfgang Mayrhuber said on ZDF public television.

But a senior US military official said the ash had affected one of NATO's F-16 fighter planes which had detected a glass build-up inside its engine.

Ash from volcanos can be turned into a glass form at high temperatures when it passes through a jet engine.

"This is a very, very serious matter that in the not too distant future will start having real impact on military capabilities," he said.

"I think the airspace is closed for a reason."

Lufthansa, Europe's biggest airline in terms of passenger numbers, saw shares plunge by almost five percent before recovering slightly.

Volker Treier, chief economist at the German Chambers of Commerce, estimated the damage to the economy at around one billion euros per day.

Air France said the disruption was costing it 35 million euros (47 million dollars) per day while British Airways said that lost revenue and one-off charges was costing it around 20 million euros a day.

The European Commission said it was prepared to authorise exceptional financial aid to airlines hit by the closure in line with regulations passed after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Winds have carried most of the ash spewing from Eyjafjoell across a wide swathe of Europe since last Wednesday.

But the eruption "diminished markedly" and the column of ash is less than half its original height of 6,000 metres (19,500 feet) on Monday, seismologist Bryndis Brandsdottir of the University of Iceland told AFP.

earlier related report
Volcano mayhem leaves travellers stuck across Asia
Sydney (AFP) April 19, 2010 - From backpackers stuck in Sydney to students stranded in Beijing, travellers across the Asia-Pacific anxiously waited to return to Europe Monday as the chaos caused by Iceland's volcano dragged on.

There were scenes of mayhem at airports, with many travellers running low on cash after being forced to extend their stays due to cancelled flights. Indian aviation officials estimated 41,400 passengers were unable to leave the country as a result of Europe's air shutdown.

English traveller Amy Briggs, 25, said the volcanic ash cloud had brought a chaotic end to her six-month holiday in Australia.

"I was supposed to leave tomorrow on British Airways, but they told me it's been cancelled. So I have to spend more money to sleep here, and it spoils the end of my trip as I spend hours calling the airline," she told AFP.

At Beijing airport, anguished travellers were told their return home might be delayed for weeks.

"We're being really badly informed and Air France is not looking after us at all," complained Barbara Devuyst, 23, part of a group of students on a study trip who had been due to fly out on Monday but were told they might not be able to go home until May 6.

Passengers have been stranded worldwide due to the plume of glass, sand and rock spewing from Iceland's Eyjafjoell volcano.

European and international agencies have been in urgent talks to try to ease the chaos after around 30 countries closed or restricted their airspace due to passenger safety fears, catching millions in a global backlog.

At New Delhi international airport Barbara Cekam, 50, was meant to leave for her hometown of Munich in Germany on Saturday with Lufthansa, but has been sleeping in the lounge.

Choking back tears ahead of her fourth night on a chair, she told AFP she would mark her 51st birthday in the overcrowded room on Tuesday.

"I can't stay in a hotel because I don't have any money," she said. "The trip was expensive and the hotels around the airport want to charge us more because they're taking advantage of the situation."

In addition, cargo as diverse as Indian gemstones and Bangladeshi clothes was held up, with garments from Bangladesh piling up at the country's main airport and exporters worried buyers would reject the shipments.

In one positive development, Alitalia said it had resumed flights from Japan to Rome and Milan after securing southern routes into Italy.

"The flights will take about two hours longer than usual, but the company will manage it by carrying less cargo," said an Alitalia spokesman in Tokyo.

The Alitalia flights, which usually pass over Siberia, will instead take a southern route over Central Asia and Turkey to avoid the ash plume over much of Europe, the company said.

Australia's Qantas said losses from the European volcanic ash were totalling about 1.5 million dollars (1.4 million US) a day.

A spokesman said two Wednesday flights from Bangkok and Hong Kong to London had been axed, and warned that Tuesday's schedule to and from Europe was also likely to be wiped out by the freak cloud of ash from the volcano in Iceland.

"We're doing our best not to create any expectations that this is going to improve as of tomorrow our time," the spokesman told AFP.

"The indications still are that the airspace closures are going to stay in place for a period still."

Some backpackers, however, took the opportunity to enjoy extra time at the beach, taking advantage of a spell of warm autumn weather.

"There are worse places to be stranded than Sydney," said Peter Miller, owner of the Great Aussie backpackers hostel.

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