Ashes to ashes

So day five and we are still in lock down. No flights in or out of the UK and indeed most of Europe. It is pretty amazing. A volcano in Iceland (a country with something of a record of exporting uncertainty) has created havoc. Travellers are stranded across the world including several world leaders who planned to attend the Polish President's funeral. The intrepid Dan Snow's attempt to recreate a Dunkirk like evacuation of British travellers from the French coast has been thwarted apparently by French border officials. If the ash continues to cloud the atmosphere, you can be sure that will be the media will been flamming up stories about supermarkets running out of green beans and roses flown in from Kenya and factories shutting down as they run out of spare parts. Perhaps the most interesting impact of the ash cloud has been to knock the election off the top of the news. Campaign managers and party leaders will be furious. So is this Mother Nature giving us a wake up call? I can just imagine her in something of a Pussy Galore outfit, waving my fist at the planet shouting 'that will teach you to ignore all the other signs I have sent about the dangers of global warning'. Maybe not. But it would do us no harm to use this time when the skies are still to reflect on what we can do to protect our planet from the damage we inflict on it.