'Stuck at Charles de Gaulle' - Hundreds more flights cancelled as French air traffic controllers strike
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Friday is the final day of school in France before the summer holidays, with many families planning an early getaway.
The strike will end on July 5th, but there is likely to be knock-on disruption over the weekend.
France's DGAC aviation authority said 933 flights departing from or arriving at French airports were cancelled on Thursday, some 10 percent of the total number of flights initially scheduled.
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Will there be more French air traffic control strikes this summer?
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At Paris airports, passengers stared at departure boards loaded with cancellations to assess their options.
"I came here on holiday to celebrate my wife's 40th birthday, but now I'm stuck at Charles de Gaulle Airport," said Julien Barthelemy, a passenger travelling to Marseille from New York, late Thursday.
"I'm currently on the waiting list for three flights and am waiting for a spot on the next one to become available."
French Prime Minister François Bayrou described the strike as "shocking".
"Choosing the day when everyone goes on holiday to go on strike at air traffic control is taking the French hostage," he told BFMTV.
You can listen to the team at The Local discuss the strike, and the likelihood of further action, on the Talking France podcast. Download
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The effects of the strike are not limited to France and the stoppage has triggered hundreds of cancellations of flights that fly over the country.
The European Airlines for Europe (A4E) association said 1,500 flights would be cancelled on Thursday and Friday in Europe, affecting 300,000 passengers.
"French air traffic control already delivers some of Europe's worst delay figures and now the actions of a minority of French air traffic control workers will needlessly disrupt the holiday plans of thousands of people in France and across Europe," said A4E chief Ourania Georgoutsakou.
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The association said the strikes also caused "almost 500,000 minutes" in delays in Europe on Thursday on nearly 33,000 commercial flights.
Ryanair, Europe's largest airline by passenger numbers, said it had cancelled more than 400 flights.
"These strikes are unacceptable," said Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary, urging the EU Commission to protect such overflights by law in case of strikes.
"Of these 400 flight cancellations, 350 would not be cancelled if the EU protected overflights over France."
The two unions taking part in the strike action - which between them represent around 30 percent of air traffic controllers - are calling for "a change of course to reinforce staffing levels, bring technical modernisation projects to fruition, and put operational priorities back at the heart of decision-making at the Direction Générale de l'Aviation Civile [the French civil aviation authority]."
The unions also "denounce the managerial excesses within the Directorate of Air Navigation Services, whose authoritarian, brutal management style, reneging on its commitments and disconnected from operational realities, maintains a climate of constant pressure and mistrust incompatible with the serenity and safety requirements of the air traffic controller's profession."
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