Sicily’s busiest gateway, Catania–Fontanarossa Airport (CTA), resumed normal arrivals and departures this morning after the Italian Civil Protection Department lowered its aviation-colour code from red to orange. The downgrade follows 48 hours of heightened volcanic-ash emissions from Mount Etna that forced the airport to close runways intermittently. Operator SAC confirmed that all night-curfew exemptions have been cancelled and the slot allocation plan has reverted to the standard 14-movements-per-hour cap. Airlines including easyJet, ITA Airways and Wizz Air are now working through a backlog of 20,000 displaced passengers. For employers the reopening removes a major bottleneck on one of Italy’s critical logistics corridors: CTA handles seasonal charters for the petrochemical plants in Gela and for the U.S. Naval Air Station at Sigonella. However, Etna’s activity remains unpredictable; companies with time-sensitive shipments are advised to keep contingency trucking options to Palermo or Comiso. Travellers should also bear in mind that CTA is not part of the current Schengen-suspension zone targeting Spanish routes, so border procedures remain unchanged. Nonetheless, mobility coordinators should build slack into itineraries during Etna’s ongoing eruption season, which typically peaks in October.
Source: ANSA
