Approximately a thousand flights were canceled in France today, mainly at Paris airports, marking the second day of the air traffic controllers’ strike.
Hundreds of thousands of people in France and across Europe had already been affected by this strike on Thursday, initiated by two minor unions demanding better working conditions and an increase in staff numbers.
The French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) estimated that 933 flights, about 10% of those initially scheduled, were canceled on Thursday, either departing from or arriving in France.
Locally, the cancellation rates were much higher: 50% in Nice, France’s third-largest airport, and 25% at the Parisian airports of Roissy/Charles-de-Gaulle and Orly, which together handle a total of 350,000 people per day during the summer.
Today, the situation is expected to become even more strained at Paris airports, as the DGAC requested airlines to cut their flight schedules by 40%.
In Spain, the strike resulted in the cancellation of 89 flights by 09:00 today (local time, 08:00 in Lisbon), coinciding with the start of the school year’s end festivities.
The strike, now on its third consecutive day, led Iberia to cancel 16 flights planned for today, while its subsidiary Air Nostrum suspended 30 flights.
Ryanair canceled 76 flights to and from Spain today, with Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona, and Valencia being the most affected airports.
The Irish airline urged European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Thursday to urgently reform the European Union’s air traffic control services to prevent such strikes from affecting overflights in French airspace and hindering travel between other countries.
The protest in France was called by the second and third largest unions in the sector, which represent just over 30% of French controllers, demanding better working conditions and an increase in workforce.
An ongoing controversial reform aims to implement a time clock system for controllers when they assume their positions, following a “serious incident” at Bordeaux airport at the end of 2022, when two planes nearly collided.
MPE // EA
Lusa/Fim
