Flights Disrupted By Frankfurt Airport Strike on Friday
Almasalla Arab Travel Portal News – A strike by security staff at Frankfurt airport caused dozens of flight cancellations and delayed thousands of passengers, bringing chaos to Europe s third largest hub on Friday.
The Verdi union had called on around 5,000 staff who carry out security checks on passengers, baggage and freight at the airport to strike for the entire day to push for their pay to be brought into line with counterparts at other German airports.
Hoards of people jostling to get to the front of lines at check-in and service desks thronged the airport, which usually handles 150,000 passengers on a typical Friday.
Some 90 flights were cancelled, with Lufthansa scrapping nearly 40, but the biggest problem was getting people through check-in and thinly-staffed security points, airport operator Fraport said.
"We’re trying our best but it’s a challenge," a spokesman for Fraport said earlier. "We tried to inform people but the strike was called at such short notice."
The airport’s terminals were still crowded on Friday evening, after Fraport halted security checks around 14:30 local time, advising passengers not to make the trip to the airport at all.
Tens of thousands of people were affected by the strike, Fraport estimated.
Earlier in Friday , passengers had booed striking staff as they walked through the terminal blowing whistles and waving placards saying: "We’re worth it."
Verdi issued a statement apologising to passengers but said it had no choice but to call for a strike after wage talks failed to result in a deal.
"We get EUR€11.70 ($16) an hour once our trial period is over. People in Stuttgart get EUR€14 an hour but we’re the ones working at Germany’s largest airport and the work is getting more stressful," Nsimba Gore, a 32-year old security assistant, said.
Verdi said more than 90 percent of security staff due to work on Friday, at least 800 people, had joined the strike. The union’s offer to let 110 people stand down from the strike for a short time to staff the security checks did not appear to ease the congestion.
The strike was called after four rounds of pay talks between Verdi and employers’ association BDSW, which represents around 185,000 security staff who work for private companies, ended without agreement. The next round of talks is due on March 5.
(Reuters)
