2,000 flights have been cancelled amid French airline strikes – with ground staff walking out and Easyjet, Ryanair and British Airways all axing flights. Flights across France will be disrupted, with many cancelled, following a call for strike action by air traffic control unions on April 25.
Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary made a statement in which he said: “French air traffic controllers are free to go on strike, that’s their right, but we should be cancelling French flights, not flights leaving Ireland, going to Italy, or flights from Germany to Spain or Scandinavia to Portugal.”
He called for “action to protect overflights which will eliminate over 90 per cent of these flight cancellations”. “While the withdrawing of strike notice may offer some relief for some passengers, its last-minute nature means that there will still be significant disruption to flights in France and across parts of Europe tomorrow,” said Ourania Georgoutsakou, the managing director of Airlines for Europe (A4E), an industry association.
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“The scale of disturbances caused by this strike movement and the impact it is having on our clients are totally unacceptable, in particular for the hundreds of thousands of clients whose flights will not take off from or land in France,” said easyJet CEO Johan Lundgren.
An easyJet spokesperson said: “We have been advised of a national air traffic control strike affecting flights flying in and out of France, as well as flights over French airspace on 25th April 2024. We expect significant disruption across our network and advise customers to check the status of their flight on our flight tracker on our mobile app or website: www.easyjet.com/en/flight-tracker.
“To provide additional support, our UK customer services lines will be extended until midnight on Wednesday 24th April and Thursday 25th April. Although this situation is outside of our control, we would like to reassure customers that we are doing all we can to minimise any disruption to our flights that may occur because of the strike action.
“easyJet has been calling for better protection of passengers during times of French ATC strike action, especially for the hundreds of thousands of customers using the French airspace but whose flights neither depart nor land in France.”
Airlines for Europe (A4E), which represents carriers including Ryanair, easyJet, British Airways parent IAG, the Lufthansa Group and Air France-KLM, warned of “significant disruption”. In a statement A4E said: “Airlines do not have full clarity of what French air traffic control capacity will be tomorrow, meaning there will still be significant disruption for flight operations and passengers.”
