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European authorities began easing six days of severe flight restrictions on Tuesday, but a new ash cloud, reported to be spreading south from the erupting volcano in Iceland, threatened to thwart part of the effort to end the Continent’s worst aviation crisis.
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The reopening of airspace under a plan agreed Monday by European ministers was cautious and unpredictable. The piecemeal nature of the response has drawn criticism from the airline industry, while passengers have been marooned from Beijing to New York, and many of Europe’s busiest flight paths have been eerily still.

The chaos has now lasted twice as long as the three-day closing of American airspace after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Britain seemed to be hardest hit by the continued perils of volcanic ash, which can damage jet engines, while most countries in Continental Europe were progressively opening flight paths by Tuesday afternoon.

Eurocontrol, the Brussels-based agency that coordinates air-traffic management across the region, said it expected around 14,000 flights on Tuesday, half of the 28,000 that are normally scheduled. The agency said that roughly 75 percent of the airspace over Europe was open.

Eurocontrol said that all European airspace was open to air traffic above elevations of 20,000 feet, which would enable intercontinental overflight traffic to resume.

Lufthansa, the German airline, said it would operate all scheduled intercontinental flights to and from Germany on Tuesday as well as “some” intra-European and domestic flights. The carrier said it expected to be able to add more European services later in the day.

But until 8 p.m., flights within German airspace were being allowed only at low altitudes and under so-called visual flight rules that require pilots to navigate by sight rather than relying on their cockpit instrument panels, the German civil aviation authority said on its Web site. All airports remained open for take-offs and landings, provided that the weather was clear enough, the authority said.

France said its airports would handle a small proportion of their usual traffic.

The French civil aviation authority said that it had re-opened airspace in the southern part of the country as of 8 a.m. and would allow domestic flights within designated corridors between Paris and Bordeaux, Toulouse, Marseille and Nice. International flights to and from Paris would also be required to fly within the designated safe corridors, it said in a statement.

Air France said that three flights had departed from Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports near Paris on Tuesday morning, and that 15 had arrived from overseas. The French flag carrier said it expected to fly a limited number of domestic and European flights from Paris on Tuesday, while all long-haul flights would operate normally.

The French daily Le Monde quoted the transport minister, Jean-Louis Borloo, as saying that empty planes would fly those routes first to make sure the amount of ash was not too high for safety. Seats on subsequent flights would be allocated initially to passengers with a “desperate need” to fly, he said.

But British authorities said that only Scottish airports would offer limited service, largely to the islands off the Scottish coast. Manchester airport, in the north of England, said it would not reopen until Tuesday evening at the earliest.

Initially, airport operators farther south in Britain had said they hoped to restore some services later in the day. Then, another eruption of the volcano in Iceland sent a new ash cloud spreading toward Britain, the British air traffic control agency said early Tuesday.

By midmorning, the agency said the situation was “dynamic” and “variable.” American Airlines said it was canceling 62 flights between Europe and the United States, and was operating flights out of Madrid, Barcelona and Rome.

British Airways said it would not operate any European flights on Tuesday. The carrier, which had hoped to resume some intercontinental services from London, abandoned those plans Tuesday afternoon.

“We will only operate flights where we have assessed the situation to be safe in accordance with all our normal operating procedures, which are based on many years of experience of operating in areas of volcanic activity around the world,” the airline said in a statement.

News reports said Switzerland had reopened its airspace, while Poland shut down four airports on Tuesday that had been operating a day earlier.

Hungary introduced a partial flight ban, and Ireland said its airspace would be closed at least until midday because of the new ash cloud heading south, Reuters reported. Airspace in Denmark and Norway remained closed, the BBC reported.

In disparate ways, European governments sought to ease the inconvenience — and mounting cost — for passengers stranded in far-flung destinations.