SPAIN: Passengers face huge disruption as air traffic controllers halt operations in an industrial dispute

Record ID: 340090

  • Title: SPAIN: Passengers face huge disruption as air traffic controllers halt operations in an industrial dispute
  • Date: 4th December 2010
  • Summary: MADRID, SPAIN (DECEMBER 3, 2010) (REUTERS) (NIGHT SCENES) VARIOUS OF PARKED PLANES / IBERIA AIRLINE PLANES PEOPLE QUEUING AT DEPARTURE AREAS DEPARTURES MONITOR CLOSE OF MONITOR SHOWING CANCELED FLIGHTS PEOPLE SITTING ON THE FLOOR PLAYING CARDS VARIOUS OF PEOPLE QUEUING AT CHECKING IN DESKS
  • Embargoed: 19th December 2010 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Spain
  • Country: Spain
  • Topics: Domestic Politics,Transport
  • Reuters ID: LVADPATWPHER877XHW1GH7THLCSA
  • Story Text: A walkout by air traffic controllers over pay closed air space around Madrid on Friday (December 3) at the start of one of the country's busiest long weekends, state-owned airport authority AENA said.
    Air space around the holiday destinations of Ibiza, Menorca and Palma, Mallorca were also closed after Spanish air traffic controllers staged a walkout in unofficial strike action, Spain's airports authority AENA said.
    Air space around the Canary Islands was also closed, airline Iberia said.
    "I was inside the plane with my child and they told us the plane was not flying as controllers had decided on strike until midnight," Ramon, a Madrid resident who was flying to Mallorca for his mother's funeral, told Reuters.
    In Barcelona, thousands of passengers travelling to Madrid and the Balearics were told to get off planes and claim their luggage.
    "We were inside the plane they had given the security instructions already and suddenly the captain say that the flight will be delayed due to problems in Barajas airport, we waited for 15 minutes and after that they decided to tell us to leave the plane and it looks that it will be cancelled it's not confirmed but we are now collecting our bags so I think that today we will not fly," Carlos, a Barcelona resident travelling to Madrid, said.
    AENA and the air traffic controllers' union have been locked in dispute over pay and working conditions for months.
    Controllers claimed sick leave and started to abandon their posts around 1600 GMT, AENA said in a statement. The authority urged passengers to stay away from the airports in question.
    "We urge them to stop blackmailing the Spanish society whom they are taking citizens hostages just in order to get back the privileged benefits that have been already approved by congress and ratified by the Spanish high court," AENA President Juan Ignacio Lema told a news conference.
    Airline Iberia estimated air space would remain closed until 0100 local time (2400 GMT).
    Madrid's Barajas airport is the country's busiest and a hub for both international and national flights. It is also the base for national carrier Iberia , which last week completed a merger with British Airways. Earlier, Spain's cabinet approved government plans to sell off 49 percent of AENA as it tries to assure markets it can meet its deficit cutting objectives.
    Air traffic controllers' relatively high salaries and short working hours have raised hackles in the Spanish media as the country applies painful public sector pay cuts as part of austerity measures to drive down the deficit.
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