(CNN) – More than 1,000 Lufthansa flights have been canceled so far due to the strike this week, and more than 130,000 passengers have been affected.
The German airline announced yesterday that it would cancel almost all of its flights in Germany in Germany on Wednesday.
Given that a ground staff strike by the Ver.di trade union will have “a huge operational impact in the middle of the peak travel season,” the airline said it was “having to cancel almost the entire flight schedule at its hubs in Frankfurt and Munich for Wednesday.”
With the summer holiday season underway, the airline said it was already working under great pressure to re-establish flight schedules for this weekend, following previous strikes. Wednesday’s strike could still lead to individual flight cancellations or delays on Thursday and Friday, Lufthansa warned.
At Frankfurt airport, a total of 678 flights will be cancelled, 32 of them on Tuesday and 646 on Wednesday, according to Lufthansa. It is estimated that 92,000 passengers will be affected.
At the Munich hub, a total of 345 flights are expected to be cancelled, including 15 on Tuesday and 330 on Wednesday. An estimated 42,000 passengers will be affected, Lufthansa said.
Cancellations include some international flights from Bangkok, Singapore, New York, Los Angeles, Johannesburg, and New Delhi.
Lufthansa, which is the German flag carrier, added that the ability to rebook passengers affected by cancellations is very limited.
The Ver.di union is calling for a 9.5% pay rise for Lufthansa ground staff, with a minimum increase of €350 ($368) per month for 12 months. Staff are overworked due to significant staff shortages, high inflation and a three-year wage freeze, the union said.
Around 20,000 workers have been asked to take part in the Ver.di strike, including ground staff, counter staff and aircraft technicians.
Michael Niggemann, chief human resources officer and labor director at Deutsche Lufthansa AG, told reporters on Tuesday that the strikes were “causing enormous damage.”
Lufthansa had offered “very significant wage increases over the next 12 months,” he said, adding that the strike was “simply no longer proportionate.”
Lufthansa’s head of media relations, Martin Leutke, told reporters on Wednesday that the “massive strike on the backs of customers is incomprehensible and unjustifiable” after going through two rounds of negotiations with the company.
He said the company was trying to rebook passengers on the best possible alternative routes and advised customers who have not confirmed flights on Wednesday not to come to the airport, saying “resources are limited here and it’s I think we can help better digitally than here at the Airport.”
The strike began at 3:45 a.m. local time (9:45 p.m. ET) on Wednesday and is expected to end at 6 a.m. local time (midnight ET) on Thursday, the union said in a statement.
Top image: Empty check-in counters for Deutsche Lufthansa AG at Terminal 1 of Frankfurt Airport in Frankfurt, Germany, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Alex Kraus/Bloomberg/Getty Images)
