Almost all flights from Berlin's two airports are to be cancelled due to a further strike by ground crews. The union is calling for a pay increase and better working hours in the face of an increased workload.
Image: Reuters/H. Hanschke
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The strike is to last from Monday until Wednesday, according to the Verdi union which represents 2,000 members of ground staff at Berlin's two major airports: Tegel in the north and Schönefeld in the south.
A spokesman for Berlin airports said that almost all flights would be cancelled on Monday: 194 at Schönefeld and 448 at Tegel. As well as Lufthansa, carriers include Air Berlin, easyJet and Ryanair.
Ground crew previously went on strike Friday, as shown in front of Berlin Tegel airport.Image: picture-alliance/dpa/G. Fischer
The union is demanding a 1 euro ($1.07) increase for hourly wages for ground staff as part of a one-year collective agreement. Berlin airport management previously offered a 10-cent increase to the hourly wage over four years, which then changed to an 8 percent increase over three years. The union is also calling for better working conditions.
"The volume is too small and the duration far too long to find a compromise on this basis," said Verdi negotiator Enrico Ruemker in a statement.
Monday's strike is a continuation from last Friday, when ground crews held a strike that led to nearly 700 cancelled flights, leaving thousands of passengers stranded. Ground crews include personnel checking in passengers, loading and unloading planes and directing airplanes on the tarmac.
The two airports service many airliners, including those of Lufthansa, Air Berlin and Ryanair. Lufthansa stated it would cancel all flights from Berlin to Frankfurt and Munich and vice versa.
kbd/jm (AFP, Reuters)
German airports boast record passenger numbers
Well over 100 million travelers departed from airports across Germany in 2016 - that's a new all-time record, according to the National Statistics Office. European destinations were most popular.
Image: dapd
Passengers galore
German airports logged a record number of 111.9 million passengers last year. The figure marked a 3.4-percent increase from a year earlier, Germany's statistics office reported.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
The further away the better?
Over 88 million people using German airports in 2016 traveled to foreign destinations. That's a 3.6-percent surge year on year. The remaining close to 24 million passengers booked domestic flights (+2.8 percent).
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Canary Islands and the like
Destinations in Europe were most popular, the figures revealed. A record number of 13.7 million people flew to Spain last year, with Greece also posting an above-average increase in arrivals.
Image: picture alliance/robertharding/A. Tovy
Tourists staying away
By contrast, the number of people using German airports and traveling to Turkey last year dropped by 16.6 percent. That's no big surprise, given the recent political upheavals and terror attacks in the country.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/K. Rose
Long-haul flights: mixed picture
Overall, the number of long-haul passengers starting from Germany edged up by 0.5 percent in 2016, with a bigger demand for flights to Asia and the Americas. But fewer people decided to travel to Africa (Egypt down 33.1 percent, Tunisia down 27.9 percent).