Major airport cancels all flights due to strike
AN AIRPORT has been forced to cancel all flights due to strike action.
Staff at Berlin Brandenburgh Airport (BER) are to walk out tomorrow, meaning most flights will be grounded.
It is expected that around 300 flights were due to take off and land on Wednesday, with the cancellations affecting around 35,000 passengers.
A spokesperson for the airport, which only opened in 2020, said it is likely no flights will operate.
They said: “The airport company must assume in this situation that no regular passenger flights can take place at BER on this day.”
A statement on the airport website confirmed: “Due to the announced warning strike at Berlin Brandenburg Airport, no passenger flights will be possible on Wednesday, 25 January 2023.
“The airport company officially informed its partners, such as the airlines, ground handling service providers, security companies and businesses located at the airport, about this in the evening.”
The Ver.di union, behind the strikes, has called on airport staff to walk out in a dispute over pay.
Staff from both aviation security and ground services are to strike.
Passengers should contact their airline before travelling tomorrow, with airlines such as easyJet and Ryanair being the main carriers from the UK.
Some travellers have already been affected by the cancellations.
One easyJet passenger wrote on Twitter: “My flight from Amsterdam to Berlin tomorrow has been cancelled! I have been changed to a flight the day after but this doesn’t work for me.”
Another traveller tweeted: “My flight from Berlin to Brisbane has been cancelled less than 24 hrs before departure and I cannot find any information, nor help from the airline, as to what are my next steps – what am I supposed to do?”
A third who had their flight to Berlin cancelled wrote: “This is crazy, how do I get home?”
One Ryanair passenger said the airline was charging them £250 to rebook their cancelled flights, calling it “scandalous”.
Here is what you should do if your flight is cancelled.
In the UK, a popular airline is stopping all flights from Cardiff Airport this month after Wizz Air confirmed it is closing its Welsh base.
Wizz Air was also once the largest operator at the now-closed Doncaster Sheffield Airport but it pulled out in June 2022, leaving just TUI flights remaining.
The UK airport closed for good in October 2022.