French strikes cause travel chaos: Ryanair cancels 170 flights

Daily Mail​

a day ago

Tens of thousands of passengers have had their travel plans disrupted after easyJet cancelled 274 flights and Ryanair axed 170 due to French air traffic control strikes. Irish low-cost airline Ryanair said the cancellations today and tomorrow will affect flights to and from France, including families travelling abroad for summer holidays. But most of its 30,000 disrupted passengers are being affected by cancellations to flights over French airspace to countries such as the UK, Greece, Spain and Ireland.
Some 15 Ryanair flights arriving at or departing from London Stansted Airport have been cancelled while others have been axed at Manchester and Edinburgh. Hundreds of flights operated by other airlines have been cancelled in France today, with the strike by two French unions also affecting air traffic across western Europe. In France, half of all flights in Nice and a quarter of flights at Paris Orly and Paris Charles de Gaulle airports, one of Europe's busiest hubs, have been cancelled.
She was planning to spend six days in the French capital but her flight from the southwestern city of Pau this morning was cancelled. 'Everyone has the right to strike, but it's punitive. Air traffic controllers aren't the worst off,' Ms Rivet said, adding she hoped to have more luck tomorrow. France's civil aviation agency the DGAC has asked airlines to cancel some of their flights to ensure there are enough controllers on duty. Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary renewed calls on European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to take 'urgent action' to reform European Union air traffic control (ATC) services in light of the disruption. Mr O'Leary said: 'Once again, European families are held to ransom by French air traffic controllers going on strike. It is not acceptable that overflights over French airspace en route to their destination are being cancelled/delayed as a result of yet another French ATC strike. It makes no sense and is abundantly unfair on EU passengers and families going on holidays.'
Ryanair has long-campaigned for an overhaul of ATC services across Europe. It wants the EU to ensure ATC services are fully staffed for the first wave of daily departures, as well as to protect overflights during national ATC strikes. 'These two splendid reforms would eliminate 90 per cent of all ATC delays and cancellations, and protect EU passengers from these repeated and avoidable ATC disruptions due to yet another French ATC strike,' Mr O'Leary added. Also today, easyJet said it had made 124 cancellations in advance for today and are making 150 cancellations in advance of tomorrow, across its European flight programme. This is out of 1,857 flights planned to operate today. An easyJet spokesman told MailOnline: 'The national strike action by French air traffic controllers today is impacting all airlines operating to and from French airports and using French airspace.
'As required by the French authorities (DGAC) easyJet proactively cancelled some flights in advance and customers were contacted directly with options to transfer to another flight for free or a refund. As this action could result in further disruption to airline's flying programmes, we advise all customers travelling on July 3 or 4 to check the status of their flights on our Flight Tracker online for the most up to date information. While this is outside of our control, we will do all we can to minimise the impact of the strike action. On behalf of our passengers we are extremely unhappy with the strike action, particularly given the current performance of French ATC which has been the leading cause of airspace delays in Europe this summer. Long term solutions must be found for our customers and crew who suffer repeated disruption.' And a British Airways spokesman said: 'Like all airlines, due to industrial action by French Air Traffic Control, we've had to make some adjustments to our schedule. This is outside of our control, and we've apologised to our customers for the disruption to their travel plans. Our teams are working to get our customers to their destinations as quickly as possible.'
MailOnline understands BA is using larger aircraft wherever it can to help accommodate customers from flights the airline has been forced to cancel. Airlines for Europe (A4E), an industry association which includes Ryanair, Air France-KLM, Lufthansa, British Airways and EasyJet, described the action as 'intolerable'. According to sources, 270 air traffic controllers out of a total workforce of around 1,400 went on strike. France's second-largest air traffic controllers' union, UNSA-ICNA, launched the action to demand better working conditions and more staff. The union is protesting 'chronic understaffing', the planned introduction of a clock-in system, outdated equipment and 'toxic management practices that are incompatible with the requirements of calm and safety'. 'The DGAC is failing to modernise the tools that are essential to air traffic controllers, even though it continues to promise that all necessary resources are being made available,' UNSA-ICNA said in a statement. 'The systems are on their last legs, and the (air traffic control) agency is constantly asking more of its staff to compensate for its difficulties.'
It was joined by the third largest union, USAC-CGT, which said the DGAC had failed to comprehend the frustration felt by controllers. The DGAC did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the trade unions' concerns. Their complaints echo grievances expressed by air traffic controllers in the US over outdated infrastructure, dramatic staffing shortfalls and failing technology. France's Transport Minister Philippe Tabarot called the unions' demands unacceptable'. The main air traffic controllers' union, SNCTA, had no plans to join the strike. Airports in the south of France were particularly hit, with 30 per cent of flights cancelled in cities including Lyon, Marseille and Montpellier. Air France said it had been 'forced to adapt its flight schedule' without specifying the number of cancellations, but stressed that its long-haul network was not affected.
By mid-morning today, flights were experiencing significant delays, including an average of 1.5 hours for arrivals and 1 hour for departures in Nice, France's third-largest airport. Tomorrow, the situation is expected to become even more tense at Paris airports and Beauvais, where the DGAC has ordered a 40 per cent reduction in the number of flights. This morning, the Eurocontrol monitoring agency warned airlines of 'significant' delays in the airspace managed by the air traffic control centres in Marseille, Brest and Reims. Some 29,000 commercial flights were scheduled for today in Europe, said Eurocontrol. Business aviation, particularly in Nice and Le Bourget near Paris, has also been significantly affected, sources said. The DGAC asked airlines to cut one in four flights in and out of Paris airports and almost half of flights out of the capital tomorrow.
Elsewhere, airlines were asked to reduce flights by 30 to 50 per cent. 'Despite these preventative measures, disturbances and significant delays are to be expected at all French airports,' the agency said, urging passengers to change their flights if they were able to. Meanwhile Ryanair said yesterday it had been hit by the recent conflict in the Middle East, and it cancelled more than 800 flights last month. It is among those to have cancelled and rerouted flights amid the conflict between Israel and Iran, as well as continued attacks in Gaza.
Last week, flights were halted at Dubai airport in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as passengers were told to expect further delays and cancellations. Ryanair said it still operated more than 109,000 flights in June, indicating that fewer than 1 per cent of flights were affected. The Ireland-based business carried 19.9million passengers in June, representing a 3 per cent increase on the same month last year. Caught up in the flight chaos today? Please email: [e-mail].