Brussels: Nearly all of the continent's 28,000 scheduled flights, including more than 300 trans-Atlantic routes, were going ahead.
Every plane was full, however, as airlines tried to squeeze in those who had been stranded for days among passengers with regular tickets.
Airlines said there was no quick solution to cut down the backlog of passengers.
"Quite frankly we don't have an answer to this," said Association of European Airlines spokesman David Henderson.
Shifting winds sent a new plume of volcanic ash over Scandinavia, forcing some airports to close again.
Restrictions
The new airspace restrictions applied to parts of northern Scotland, southern Norway, Sweden and Finland, said Eurocontrol European air traffic agency spokeswoman Kyla Evans.
Oil rig workers were trapped Thursday on platforms in the North Sea because helicopters were grounded.
A week of airspace closures caused by the ash threat to planes created the worst breakdown in civil aviation in Europe since World War II.
$2b loss
More than 100,000 flights were cancelled and airlines are on track to lose more than $2 billion.
The aviation crisis that began with an April 14 volcanic eruption in Iceland left millions of passengers in limbo and sparked calls for a wholesale reform of Europe's air traffic system.
Some travellers got a break. Authorities chartered a luxury cruise ship — the Celebrity Eclipse — to pick up 2,200 tourists in the northern Spanish port of Bilbao on Thursday and bring them back to England.
A British Royal Navy ship also arrived in Portsmouth, southern England, carrying 440 troops coming home from Afghanistan and 280 civilians back from Santander, Spain.
Spain, which was mostly unaffected by the crisis, launched 600 special flights to help move an estimated 90,000 stranded passengers in the past three days. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines expanded capacity on high-traffic routes.
