ETHIOPIA’S HAYLI GUBBI VOLCANO DISRUPTS FLIGHTS ACROSS INDIA

Tue 25 November 2025:

Volcanic ash from the Ethiopian Hayli Gubbi volcano has affected the air traffic in India since Monday, with several flights canceled.

At least seven international flights were cancelled, and over 10 overseas flights were delayed at the Delhi airport on Tuesday due to the ash plumes, according to the Press Trust of India.

Air India has cancelled 13 flights since Monday, while other carriers, including Akasa Air, have also taken similar measures.

The clouds are drifting towards the western parts of India, according to reports.

On Monday, the Hayli Gubbi volcano, the southernmost in the Mount Erta Ale range in Ethiopia’s northeastern Afar region, erupted for the first time in 12,000 years, sending a massive ash column drifting over nearby communities.

Erta Ale, an active volcanic zone in northern Ethiopia, includes several volcanoes, such as Hayli Gubbi.

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There were no casualties from the eruption, which sent thick plumes of smoke up to 14km (nine miles) into the sky, sending ash clouds to Yemen, Oman, India, and northern Pakistan, according to the Toulouse Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre (VAAC) in France.

Ahmed Abdela, a resident of the Afar region, said it “felt like a sudden bomb had been thrown”. Many people who had been heading to the Danakil desert, a local tourist attraction, were left stranded in ash-covered Afdera on Monday, he said.

Mohammed Seid, a local administrator, said there were no casualties, but the eruption could have economic implications for the local community of livestock herders.

“While no human lives and livestock have been lost so far, many villages have been covered in ash, and as a result, their animals have little to eat,” he said.

The volcano, which rises about 500 metres in altitude, sits within the Rift Valley, a zone of intense geological activity where two tectonic plates meet.

The Smithsonian Institution’s Global Volcanism Program said Hayli Gubbi has had no known eruptions during the current geological epoch, which experts know as the Holocene.

The Holocene began approximately 12,000 years ago at the end of the last Ice Age.

Afar authorities have not yet reported casualties.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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