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[News > World news > Air transport]
The sound of silence: Heathrow's neighbours welcome ash break
｛静寂の音、ヒースロー空港の近隣者、火山灰による休止に一息｝

Patrick Kingsley
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 April 2010 21.21 BST
Article history

{{Smoke and ash but no planes. Heathrow's neighbours wake up to the rare sound of silence.}{
{Photograph}: Ingolfur Juliusson/Reuters}

For decades they have been deafened by the roar of low-flying aircraft whizzing in and out of neighbouring Heathrow. But yesterday, for the first time in 25 years, residents of Hatton, a suburb in south-west London, woke up to the glorious sound of silence.

"It's a historic moment," grinned data manager Peter Smith, 42, as he relaxed in the beer garden of his local pub, the Green King. "This is the first time I've been able to sit here and have a quiet drink outside in the afternoon." His colleague John Marshall, 48, agreed: "Normally it's not a very pleasant place to be. The beer usually shakes. But today it's actually quite relaxing."

On average, 1,300 planes fly in and out of Heathrow's five terminals every day – a flight every one or two minutes. At the Green King, which is directly under several flight paths, this made for stilted banter. Vanessa Bradley, 37, a financial adviser sitting at a neighbouring table, explained: "You'd have to pause your conversation for about 10 seconds every minute or two. Or you had to learn to lipread really, really well. Now we can actually hear what everyone's saying."

Bradley herself was celebrating with brio. "I love it!" she exclaimed, as she punched the air with both fists. "It's just so peaceful. When I got home from work yesterday, I could just sit in my garden and enjoy a bit of quiet for once."

Meanwhile, up the road at St George's church in Hanworth, a clergyman was also smiling. "It's a temporary relief because whenever we have low-flying planes," said Father Paul Williamson, 61, "I get really worried about our medieval stained glass windows getting damaged by the sonic waves. The reverberations are usually a serious problem." The flight situation has also had unexpected spiritual benefits. "Though you should always be able to pray at any time," Father Williamson said, "prayer is always better without all the noise."

Even the footballers at the local club, Bedfont FC, are pleased. Grant Mullins, 27, the club's steward, noted: "When a plane's flying over the pitch, you usually can't hear much. But the players will have heard the ref's whistle a lot better in the match last night." Indeed, Bedfont went on to thrash league rivals Horley Town 4-1.

Back at the Green King, however, not everyone was happy. Clare Applegarth, 38, a colleague of Bradley's, was shaking her head at the day's events. "To be honest, I miss the planes. It was always quite exciting when they came over. And when you're working, you get so used to them that they don't cause a problem."

Lewis Smith, 25, was similarly unimpressed. "My aunt was supposed to be flying out yesterday," he explained, frowning. "She had one flight cancelled then, and another cancelled today. It's an absolute nightmare."

But Farzana Rafique, 43, a childminder, summed up the overall mood of the town as she returned home from Hatton Cross tube. "It's just been a relief. Everyone usually gets a bit irritated by the noise, but I've noticed that people have been a bit calmer today. It's made a difference to me, at least."


[News > Science]
The science of volcanic eruptions
｛火山噴火の科学的考察｝

It took a month to fully come to the boil. Scientists explain how Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano finally blew its top
David Adam
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 April 2010 16.10 BST
Article history

{{Volcanic ash, viewed under a microscope at Sheffield Hallam University, that originated from the volcano in Iceland.}
{Photograph}: Sheffield Hallam University/PA}

Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano is in the second phase of an eruption that began last month. Like all volcanos, the eruption started when boiling hot subterranean liquid rock, known as magma, found a weak spot in the Earth's crust and burst through. Scientists spent weeks analysing the gases and magma that emerged, which is then renamed as lava.

Mike Burton, senior volcanologist with the Italian National Institute for Geophysics and Volcanology, said: "Thanks to its location between the glaciers, it produced a largely ash-free eruption, with abundant lava flows. I conducted measurements of the gas emissions from the eruption in collaboration with Icelandic scientists."

That phase of the eruption died down last week, but Eyjafjallajokull was not finished. A second, more powerful, eruption occurred when magma burst through at another point. Unlike the first eruption, this rupture in the Earth's crust was close to the volcano's glacier-covered summit. Fire met ice and fire won. Massive amounts of ice melted and flash floods followed.

Once the eruption melted away its icy lid, some 150 metres (492ft) thick, the volcano began to belch ash into the atmosphere.

"With the ice cover removed, magma is erupting into the atmosphere," Burton said. "The abundant water that surrounds the eruptive site is interacting explosively with the magma to produce the abundant ash."

As magma rises quickly from the Earth's bowels during a violent eruption, it experiences a rapid pressure drop. Gas dissolved in the magma starts to emerge and forms bubbles, just as it does in champagne when a cork is released.

The bubbles, fuelled in this case by millions of gallons of ice-cold water, makes the magma froth violently. And when the boiling fragments of liquid magma hit cold air and water they freeze into individual dust particles, driven upwards towards the high atmosphere by the power and heat of the eruption.

Dr Colin Macpherson, a volcano specialist at Durham University, said: "Eyjafjallajokull is one of many volcanos that pepper the boundary between the tectonic plates that move North America and Europe apart from one another at 2cm per year. Most of these volcanos lie beneath sea level but in Iceland the volcanos have built land."

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[News > World news > Zimbabwe]
Stay out of Africa this time, Nelson Mandela's wife tells Britain
｛今回は、アフリカに口出ししないで、ネルソンマンデラ議長夫人が英国人に語る｝

Graça Machel condemns UK on its Zimbabwe policy, telling Westminster politicians to 'keep quiet' about former colonies
David Smith in Johannesburg
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 April 2010 18.41 BST
Article history

{{Graça Machel, who has criticised Britain's 'big brother' attitude to Zimbabwe and other former colonies, with her husband Nelson Mandela in parliament.}
{Photograph}: Schalk Van Zuydam/EPA}

One of Africa's most eminent political figures has condemned Britain for taking a patronising "big brother" attitude to its former colonies.

Graça Machel, a founder member of the Elders group of world leaders and the wife of Nelson Mandela, warned British politicians to "keep quiet" about countries such as Zimbabwe and let African diplomacy take its course.

Machel, 64, is a former first lady of Mozambique, where she served as education minister, and has won numerous international awards for her advocacy of women's and children's rights.

In an interview with the Guardian in Johannesburg, she indicated that the crisis in Zimbabwe has revealed the shortcomings of a persistent imperialist mindset.

"Can I be a little bit provocative?" Machel said. "I think this should be an opportunity for Britain to re-examine its relationship with its colonies. To acknowledge that with independence those nations will want to have a relationship with Britain which is of shoulder to shoulder, and they will not expect Britain to continue to be the big brother.

"When a nation is independent, there is no big brother. They are partners. Part of the reason why Britain finds it difficult to accept Zimbabwe is precisely because that relationship of a big brother is influencing [efforts] to try to understand."

Britain, along with the EU and US, has imposed travel restrictions and asset freezes on Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe and his political and business allies. It has defied calls from South Africa to end these measures for the sake of the power sharing agreement between Mugabe's Zanu-PF and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

Earlier this year David Miliband, the foreign secretary, said the UK would be "guided by what the MDC says to us about the conditions under which it is working and leading the country". Critics said this handed Zanu-PF a propaganda coup, allowing it to portray the MDC as a puppet of Britain and blame it for sanctions.

Machel added: "I'm not saying things are OK, they're all fine in Zimbabwe. I'm saying a different kind of dialogue, a different kind of bridge to try to understand the other side could have produced a different result from what it is.

"The more the British shout, the worse the situation will be in terms of relationship with Zimbabwe. That's why sometimes I really question, when something happens in Zimbabwe and Britain shouts immediately. Can't they just keep quiet? Sometimes you need just to keep quiet. Let them do their own things, let SADC (Southern African Development Community) deal with them, but keep quiet, because the more you shout, the worse [it is]."

Asked if Britain's attitude is patronising to its former colonies, Machel replied: "I'm afraid so. And what I'm saying is they have expectations which do not always coincide with what are the aspirations and expectations of those who are their former colony.

"When you change the relationship, you just have to give yourself to take the humility to stop and listen. And when you listen, then you take into account the other side. You put your case, then you take the other side. In a way, you harmonise interests of both sides."

Zimbabwe will mark 30 years of independence this weekend. Britain remains politically and economically influential and denies Mugabe's claim that it reneged on promises to fund the redistribution of land to the black majority. Mugabe's response, the chaotic seizure of white-owned farms, has been blamed for the collapse of Zimbabwean agriculture.

Machel, whose first husband was the late Mozambique president Samora Machel, called on Britain to take a broader view of the African continent. "That's one of the issues, particularly with the British people: because of the emotional attachment they have with Zimbabwe, in many cases they define the continent in terms of Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is one country among 53 countries, so you have all the rest of 52 countries. Well, let us put aside Somalia also, which is a failed state. But you have 50 countries who are running a relatively normal situation in the continent.

"I would like to raise with you the issue that yes, Zimbabwe has failed, and it is hurting British people directly, but there's much, much more to Africa than Zimbabwe."

Machel, who became Mandela's third wife in 1998, also accused developed countries of double standards on CO2 emissions and climate change.

"This has been very clearly stated at the negotiations to Copenhagen. They know – the developing world, including China – that Africa has very small responsibility in the impact of climate change, but Africa is the one paying the highest price."

Britain's intentions are still treated with scepticism in Zimbabwe, even among some members of the MDC. Eddie Cross, policy co-ordinator general of the MDC, said: "Perfidious Albion. I tell you, you Brits have a well-deserved reputation for perfidity in your colonial relations … I think Britain's always been very sophisticated in its relations with its former colonies – it's got more experience than any other state in the world – but it doesn't necessarily make them right.

"Britain's role in the last 10 years has often been difficult for us in the MDC to interpret and read. Sometimes they've backed certain initiatives in Zimbabwe which have not been helpful in terms of pursuing a principled transfer of power and I think sometimes the Brits regard us as being rather naïve in the MDC and they have a rather jaundiced view of Africa and African politics."

But Cross, an economist and MP, added that other European powers probably behaved worse: "Samora Machel once said to me: 'If you were to choose to be colonised, you would never choose to be colonised by the Portuguese.' The colonial record was pretty dismal. For the British it was probably the best."