Travellers in Germany have been warned to “refrain from travel” on Friday as ground handlers and security staff at several major airports prepare to strike over an ongoing pay dispute.
The 24-hour strike on Friday 17 February has been called by Germany’s ver.di union and will affect the country’s two biggest aviation hubs – in Frankfurt and Munich – as well as airports in Stuttgart, Hamburg, Dortmund, Hanover and Bremen.
Munich Airport will be “massively affected” as all commercial flights on Friday have been cancelled, with more than 700 flights affected. The strike also coincides with the three-day Munich Security Conference, where several high-profile guests, including UK prime minister Rishi Sunak, are scheduled to speak.
Frankfurt Airport has warned operations will be “heavily disrupted” and passengers are “strongly advised to refrain from travelling to the airport”. Connecting flights will also be affected by the strike.
Lufthansa has cancelled more than 1,300 flights across its Munich and Frankfurt hubs, but expects operations to be "largely back to normal" by Saturday (18 February). The carrier stated that affected passengers have been notified and, where possible, offered alternative flight or rail connections.
Munich Airport CEO and president of the German Air Transport Association, Jost Lammers, said: "The nationwide strikes announced at several airports in Germany no longer have anything to do with the instrument of a warning strike. With this, ver.di is completely overstepping the mark and is carrying out the wage dispute on the backs of passengers. The wage dispute must be resolved at the negotiating table and not in the terminals at the expense of passengers."
In a statement ver.di deputy chair, Christine Behle, said: “There is still a catastrophic labour shortage among ground handling workers – travellers felt this clearly last summer.”
In order to rectify the situation, she stated an “attractive wage increase” is needed, adding that security staff are also entitled to better pay to combat inflation and high energy and food prices.
This week has been particularly challenging for travellers in Germany. The strike comes after an outage of Lufthansa’s IT systems at its Frankfurt hub on Wednesday caused flight delays and cancellations.