Marconiphone, so just what do you call those KLM, Lufthansa and Condor pilots who are flying right now in search of a solution? It's nice to say that the ice may even make this ash even more dangerous (please give a link to this, not heard it before), but that does not answer the question: is there enough of the stuff up here to do any damage?
Any sensible pilot would ground his airplane the moment he thinks there is a real threat out there, so that's not the point.
Allrounder, if 'wind' is your answer to question number one, we might as well close of the rest of the worlds airspace. Clearly that's not what you want. So the question is very relevant. How close was Moody to the vulcano, how relevant is his case to our little situation.