The employees of the Lufthansa Airport have been negotiating with the relevant authorities for the last couple of months for better pay.
However, their negotiations have not yielded any fruit, which is why the staff has decided to walk out and go on strike.
Consequently, 200,000 passengers have been predicted to be affected due to the strike, causing widespread disruption in the travel and tourism sector in Germany.
Travel disruptions
As per sources, various locations have sustained disruptions and are likely to face even more challenges.
These include Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich, Dusseldorf, Stuttgart, Cologne-Bonn, and Hamburg, to name a few.
As a result, the airports in all these locations have also had to face problems with respect to passengers being transferred or left stranded.
In addition, around 80 to 90% of the flights flying to and leaving from these airports are likely to be cancelled after the walkout of the staff of Lufthansa.
The strike began earlier in the week and is said to continue for a couple of days. The staff have scheduled further walkouts, which are all set to take place at the Frankfurt Airport.
This has prompted staff of different airports located in Hamburg, Berlin, Munich, Dusseldorf, Stuttgart, and Cologne-Bonn to also stage the same.
Lufthansa
After the negotiations between employees and relevant authorities failed and the walkout took place, the airport released a statement warning of delays and cancelations.
It went on to add that the 35-hour warning strike of the employees could lead to a cancelation of around 90% of the flights flying to and departing from the airport.
The company further informed that passengers who suffer in lieu of the cancelations of flights will be granted permission to make bookings once again without being charged any additional costs.
On the other hand, those who had flights scheduled for within the country can exchange it free of charge for a rail voucher.
Consequently, they will be able to move forward with their travel plans without any hassles.
Airports
Services by the airports are likely to resume sometime later in the week, but flight disruptions have been predicted for the coming weeks.
As of now, Lufthansa has advised passengers not to travel to the airport unless they have confirmation that their flight is operating,
In addition, a warning has been issued to the passengers of possible cancelations, which is why they should check the Lufthansa application or email for new details.
This is the second time in the month of February that mass cancelations of flights have taken place at the Lufthansa airport.
The walkouts took place because the Ver.di union has been seeking raises in pay and has been negotiating with the management for an increase of 12.5%.
It also suggested that if pay rises of that percentage are not possible, then the company should offer a total of €500 to each employee every month.
The pay rises that are currently being negotiated include interests of around 25,000 employees. This includes aircraft handling, check-in, freight staff, as well as maintenance employees.
