Due to a strike, traffic will stop at several international airports in Germany on Friday.
According to the operators’ announcements on Wednesday, the country’s largest airport, Frankfurt, and the second airport, Munich, will not launch or receive passenger flights on Friday. Traffic will also be suspended at Hamburg International Airport throughout the day, and serious disruptions, delays, and flight cancellations are to be expected elsewhere due to the strike announced by the largest employee representation in the service sector, the Ver.di trade union.
The forced break is expected to last at all affected airports from midnight on Friday to one in the morning on Saturday. Non-commercial flights will be able to operate, so aid shipments to the residents of the disaster zones in Turkey and Syria affected by the earthquake will be able to depart, and Munich will receive planes transporting guests to the world’s most prestigious security policy forum, the Munich Security Conference (MSC) – heads of state, heads of government, ministers, company managers.
In addition to Frankfurt, Munich and Hamburg, Ver.di has called the ground staff and traffic safety workers of Bremen, Dortmund, Hanover, and Stuttgart international airports to go on strike.
The work stoppage is related to collective bargaining negotiations for roughly 2.3 million public sector workers. Examples of directly or indirectly affected employee groups include airport firefighters, aviation law enforcement, and many other employees of local-provincial-owned airport operating companies.
Ver.di is demanding a wage increase of 10.5 percent and at least 500 euros, justifying the pressure by the ineffectiveness of the negotiations.
There were also serious disruptions in air transport in Germany on Wednesday, because the IT system of the biggest German player in the sector, the Lufthansa Group’s headquarters in Frankfurt, was damaged during railway construction in Frankfurt. Due to the malfunction, Lufthansa flights from Frankfurt could not be launched for hours, and the disruption disrupted the schedule of several other airports in Germany.
MTI
