Bali Airport Reopens After Erupting Volcano Cancels Flights
More Than 400 Flights Canceled as Volcano Forces Bali Shutdown
(Bloomberg) -- Indonesia’s Bali airport resumed services after a halt caused by a fresh eruption at the Mount Agung that sent volcanic ashes several miles high into the sky above the popular tourist island.
The airport opened at 2:30 p.m. local time, according to its twitter feed. The shutdown, the second in seven months, led to cancellation of 446 flights, including 207 international ones, affecting about 75,000 passengers, Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency, said on Twitter.
Mount Agung volcano continued to belch ash and smoke after ash clouds rose as high as 16,454 feet (5,142m) above sea level, according to the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry. The airport at Bali, the biggest tourist destination in Indonesia, was shut down for more than a day in November, leading to losses of about $1 billion for the tourism industry.
The Bali airport was shut from 3 a.m. local time, PT Angkasa Pura I, the state-run airport operator, said earlier. Authorities were scheduled to review the closing at noon after taking into account the latest volcanic ash distribution data, state air-navigation operator AirNav said in a statement.
Qantas Airways Ltd., Singapore Airlines Ltd., AirAsia Bhd. and PT Garuda Indonesia are among the airlines operating flights to Bali, which draws an estimated 5 million tourists annually.
AirAsia Indonesia canceled at least 50 flights to and from Bali, the airline said in statement. Garuda and its unit PT Citilink Indonesia also canceled flights, the companies said in separate statements.
--With assistance from Kyunghee Park.
To contact the reporter on this story: Rieka Rahadiana in Jakarta at rrahadiana@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Thomas Kutty Abraham at tabraham4@bloomberg.net, Sam Nagarajan, Ville Heiskanen
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