Air traffic will be very disrupted in Germany on Friday September 2 due to a 24-hour strike by Lufthansa airline pilots. Flights from Munich and Frankfurt, two major airports, will be cancelled. The disturbances will be significant, as will the differences between union and management, auguring a social conflict that could last.
With our correspondent in Berlin, Guillaume Thibaut
About 150,000 passengers are affected by the cancellation of 800 Lufthansa flights this Friday. A blow for the airline. It had had to cancel many connections in recent weeks due to the lack of manpower at airports. Two months ago, a one-day warning strike by ground staff brought the airline to a standstill.
This time it’s the Cockpit pilots’ union calling for a strike. The organization wants a salary increase of 5.5% for this year and an automatic inflation catch-up. Lufthansa, which has offered wage increases of 900 euros per month to the 5,000 pilots, denounces today’s strike and criticizes wage demands that would lead to increases of 40%.
Beyond that, differences on the company’s strategy underlie the conflict. The Cockpit union accuses Lufthansa of having called into question an agreement reserving the piloting of a certain number of aircraft to better paid house staff. The company had, because of the Covid pandemic, created a company with employees paid less.