As Europe's airspace reopened for business, air traffic agency Eurocontrol said it anticipates an almost 100 percent resumption of air traffic on Thursday.

On Wednesday, more than 20,000 flights out of a normal weekday total of 28,000 went ahead. The six-day flight ban - implemented after a cloud of ash from an Icelandic volcano paralysed the air industry - has been lifted in most countries, with all Europe's main air hubs up and running.

In Europe's far north, airspace over Helsinki in Finland and the remote Scottish isles of Orkney and Shetland was temporarily reclosed due to still unsafe ash levels.

Busiest hubs: almost 100 percent service
Germany was one of the last countries to lift air traffic restrictions and Lufthansa said it would fly at full capacity on Thursday by operating around 1800 flights. All long-haul passenger services from Paris' main international Charles de Gaulle Airport were operating as scheduled.

In the UK, airspace was reopened at 22:00 local time on Tuesday, allowing long-haul flights to land at Heathrow Airport, Europe's busiest. A flight from Vancouver, Canada, was the first to arrive. But it was still relatively quiet at Heathrow on Wednesday, as most flights had been cancelled.

Worst aviation disruption since WWII
It's estimated that some 100,000 flights were cancelled in the worst disruption to aviation since the Second World War. International air transport group IATA says the disruption has cost the industry more than 1.3 billion euros and called on European governments to financially assist the carriers.

Experts in Iceland say the Eyjafjallajökull glacier volcano has now lost most of its intensity, spewing nearly 80 percent less ash than the past few days. Seismologists warn that the volcano hasn't yet gone asleep and that it's impossible to predict when it would stop erupting. The ash plume can currently reach a height of three kilometres, below the altitudes used by European aircraft. At the beginning of the eruption, the ash plume reached an altitude of 11 kilometres.

Ash plume back to Iceland at weekend
A forecast change in wind direction should also be favourable for European airspace. It's expected that the ash smoke will be blown in a northerly and north easterly direction. At the weekend, westerly winds are expected to blow the ash clouds over the Icelandic capital, Reykjavik, possibly disrupting air traffic in and out of the country.

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