As airport workers are set on national salaries, hundreds of flights have been cancelled across Germany, causing great disruption to atmospheric travelers.
Industrial measures led by trade union Verdi began unexpectedly at Hamburg airport on Sunday before spreading to a nationwide strike.
Passengers from Frankfurt, Munich, Berlin and other major hubs have been urged not to travel to airports, causing business to be significantly disrupted. Frankfurt, Germany’s busiest airport, said passengers would not be able to board the flight and the transfer would be “almost certainly” affected.
Verdi, representing the public sector and transport workers, is in an ongoing conflict over wages and working conditions.
According to German media, thousands of flights will be cancelled throughout the day, which can disrupt travel for more than 500,000 passengers.
The Luftansa Group, whose main hub is in Frankfurt, has confirmed “delays and extensive cancellations” on all airlines.
Meanwhile, Munich Airport warned that its flight schedule has been significantly reduced. This includes flights with Eurowings, Austrian Airlines and Swiss Airlines.
Katyablom, a Hamburg Airport spokesperson whose all 143 scheduled departures have already been cancelled Monday, said Verdi is “disgraceful” to call strikes without notice at the start of the holiday season.
She said Sunday’s strike was “overly and unfair to tens of thousands of travelers who have nothing to do with the conflict.”
A Verdi spokesman accepted that the strike would have many impacts, but said travel disruptions are needed to extract better wage offers.
Lars Stubbe, the union’s representative for Hamburg, told the BBC:
Many of Frankfurt Airport’s 1,770 scheduled flights have already been cancelled, but the majority of Munich’s 820 flights are expected to be cancelled.
Hundreds of more cancellations are expected across Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Cologne and Berlin.
According to public broadcaster NDR, many passengers had already checked their luggage and had the trouble of being returned.
ADV, which represents Germany’s major airports, said the strike “has almost completely paralyzed air traffic.”
Verdi’s request will add an additional wage increase of 8%, or 350 euros (£294) per month for all workers.
Stubbe said the airport’s wage range exceeded the minimum wage, but between 13 and 25 euros per hour, particularly security staff, had fewer annual leave than others.
“We had two negotiations where the employer hadn’t offered a penny yet,” he added.
“It’s very normal to not receive an offer in the first round, but now even in the second round, employers are basically saying, “No, I’m not going to offer an offer because I don’t have the money.” ”
In a statement, BDLS, the organization that sets security salaries, said: “The damage caused by this strike is almost exclusive to businesses that are not on the negotiation table.”
It called on the government to ban short-term strikes, adding that air transport is “essential as a place of business for Germany.”
ADV general manager Ralph Beisel said the strike has affected air traffic in Europe and around the world, and missed connections due to the “domino effect.”
He called for reforms to German strike laws on “critical” infrastructure.
The so-called “warning strike,” an established tactic in German wage negotiations, concerns two separate wage disputes. One is broader disagreement regarding airport security guards and wages to federal and local government employees.
Verdi is also seeking waste collection strikes in several German cities, including Berlin, Essen and Kiel, where bins have not been released since last week.
Government workers’ pay is scheduled to be rebooted in Potsdam on Friday, with the next round of airport security staff scheduled to begin on March 26th.
Niklas Benras of VKA, which regulates pay and conditions for city workers, also criticised the strike, saying Verdi’s demand would cost nearly 15 billion euros.
“With a total liability of approximately 160 billion euros, these requests are not financially viable,” he added.
