John F. Kennedy University professor Chuck Piazza thought his annual vacation in Taormina, Sicily, would be routine. The volcanic eruption in Iceland changed all that.
The last leg of this trip home was a British Airways flight from London. Piazza's arrival at Heathrow Airport was met by a growing crowd of air travelers grounded by airborne volcanic ash from the eruption.
The seasoned traveler, professor at the Pleasant Hill campus and business management expert, did not suspect that he would spend the next seven days trying to leave the Marriot Gatwick airport hotel.
"What impressed me is that you would expect people to be really aggressive, pushing and shoving. People were very generous with each other," Piazza said. "Heathrow normally processes about 188,000 people a day, 40,000 Americans."
People were on their cell phones, BlackBerries and laptops devising ways to get out, as British Airways distributed hotel vouchers and rebooked travel dates.
ContraCostaTimes.com
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