Summary
Pilots and cabin crew at Germany’s largest airline launched simultaneous strikes that led the carrier to call off nearly 800 flights, a disruption the airline says affected about 100,000 passengers. An alternative tally from the German airport association ADV put the scale somewhat lower, counting more than 460 cancelled flights and nearly 70,000 travellers impacted. Lufthansa said it expects to operate a normal schedule again on Friday and is attempting to rebook people on other group carriers or partner airlines.
Details of the disruption
The cancellations were concentrated at Lufthansa’s principal hubs, Frankfurt and Munich. Departure boards at both airports indicated the majority of the day’s flights were removed from service, including routes to destinations beyond Europe. The airline released a statement describing the passenger fallout as "extremely harsh and disproportionately" affecting travellers, and confirmed efforts to place affected customers on alternative flights ahead of a planned return to normal timetables on Friday.
The walkout was organised by two unions: pilots represented by the VC union and flight attendants organised under UFO. The action coincided with the start of the Berlinale film festival in Berlin and the gathering of political and military figures for the Munich Security Conference, scheduled to begin the following day in Munich.
Roots of the dispute
The pilot action centres on a dispute over pensions at Lufthansa’s core passenger airline and its cargo unit. VC had signalled its readiness to strike after a ballot last year designed to pressure the company into offering more generous retirement benefits. Negotiations have resumed intermittently since then, but talks have not produced an agreement.
Lufthansa has previously labelled its core airline a "problem child" and says it lacks the financial room to meet the unions’ pension demands. Separately, UFO called on members at the CityLine subsidiary to strike in reaction to a planned shutdown of that unit’s flight operations and what UFO described as "the employer’s continued refusal to negotiate a collective social plan".
Union comments
"The simultaneous industrial action by pilots is a coincidence, but one that is welcome," said UFO representative Harry Jaeger.
"We want to annoy management, not passengers," he added.
Operational and passenger impact
The two different tallies - Lufthansa’s close-to-800 cancellations versus ADV’s estimate of more than 460 - highlight uncertainty around the full scope of the stoppage. In both accounts, the interruption affected a substantial number of travellers and forced the airline to invoke contingency plans to move passengers onto other carriers within its network or third-party partners before services are expected to normalise on Friday.
Given the unions involved and ongoing negotiations that have produced intermittent progress but no settlement, the near-term trajectory of labour relations at the airline remains uncertain.