Strike at 11 German airports starts, grounding flights on Thursday
Many travellers planning to fly into or out of 11 major German airports on Thursday will have to make alternative arrangements due to a one-day strike by security staff.
Security workers at airports in Frankfurt, Hamburg, Bremen, Berlin, Leipzig, Düsseldorf, Cologne, Hanover, Stuttgart, Erfurt and Dresden have begun a one-day strike due to last until Thursday night.
The Verdi union began its strike action late on Wednesday evening at Cologne/Bonn airport, where, according to Verdi, the night shift for passenger control did not turn up for work. The participation rate there was 100%, according to union spokesperson Özay Tarim.
"It was a successful start to the strike," he said.
Around 80% of the flight movements planned for Thursday in Cologne/Bonn were cancelled, according to the airport website in the early hours of Thursday morning. Tarim expected this proportion to increase as the day progressed.
At Berlin, Hamburg and Stuttgart airports, all take-offs were cancelled. In Dusseldorf, on the other hand, only a third of flights were cancelled, with two-thirds still scheduled to take place.
Tarim criticized that a security company at Dusseldorf Airport had offered an extra payment of €200 ($216) so that employees would come to work despite the strike. He considered such a "strike-breaking bonus" to be a provocation.
In Frankfurt, Germany's flagship airline Lufthansa intends to maintain the majority of its schedule, including long-haul flights. Flights for transfer passengers will also be offered. However, the carrier has warned that passengers could face longer waiting times in the transit area.
According to estimates by the airport association ADV, around 1,100 flights will be cancelled or delayed. This would affect around 200,000 passengers.
Normal flight operations are likely to resume on Friday. The next Verdi strike is then already planned - nationwide in local public transport.
Airports in Germany's southern state of Bavaria, including in Munich and Nuremberg, are not affected by the strike as security staff there are public sector workers covered by a different union contract.
Lufthansa is offering free rebooking for affected passengers until February 8.
Lufthansa also said that all travellers booked for domestic German flights on Thursday can exchange their bookings for railway tickets at no cost, regardless of whether their specific flight is cancelled or not.
The Verdi trade union called the strike amid collective bargaining talks with private aviation security firms. The union is demanding pay increases and other benefits for roughly 25,000 airport security staff.
ADV boss Ralph Beisel complained that airport operators will suffer from the strikes even though they aren't involved in the labour talks.
Tarim told dpa that workers hoped to send a clear signal to employers and increase pressure for concessions at the negotiating table.
The union is demanding across-the-board raises of €2.80 per hour. Wages in aviation security jobs currently begin at €20.60 per hour.
A spokesman for the Association of Aviation Security Companies (BDLS) said that employers have offered a 4% pay rise for this year and 3% for next year, but rejected the trade union's demand as unaffordable.
Germany has been hit by a series of labour strikes in transport over the past week.
A multi-day nationwide strike against state-owned railway Deutsche Bahn by the GDL train drivers' union ended on Monday, while a separate one-day strike by local public transit workers in most of the country is set for Friday.
