Google Insights, which allows users to search on the most searched searches, shows that in the last seven days, there really has been only one thing on the minds of the information-seeking UK public: When are the airports going to reopen?
Of course, many of those looking for the latest update from the UK will not be just the British public, but stranded visitors trapped in our election obsessed nation.
Rising UK Google searches in the last seven days on 20 April 2010
Topping the list of rising searches is air traffic controller Nats, which issued the ban on flights in UK airspace. According to Google, when you see Breakout listed instead of an actual percentage, it means that the search term has experienced a change in growth greater than 5000 per cent. Indeed, when I visited the site, I found it has gone offline as a result of the heavy traffic driving there.
Nats closed its site due to the ironically "heavy traffic"
Two major British airports, Heathrow and Manchester, are next on the list of Google’s UK rising searches. As I am writing this post, the Civil Aviation Authority has confirmed that airports will begin to reopen tonight, which could signal the end of the crisis and mean that I will be able to fly on holiday, as planned, on Friday evening.
Channel tunnel train Eurostar follows closely on the list, as thousands of would-be passengers frantically search for an alternative way to get home.
Most of Eurostar’s trains incoming UK trains are fully booked until the weekend Eurostar says, even though, according to reports, an extra 20,000 passenger places have been put on per day across Eurostar, Eurotunnel and the Channel ferries.
But championing fifth place in rising searches is Formula One, which has nothing to do with no-fly zones whatsoever – unless some hopeful soles are seeking Jenson Button to pick them up from holiday.
