The
strike by Lufthansa ground staff
began during the night and will last 27 hours.
The public sector union "Ver.di" has called on the employees of the various Lufthansa companies in Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin and Duesseldorf to abstain from work.
German media reported it.
Together with Munich, Frankfurt airport will be the most affected, predicts the website of the weekly Der Spiegel.
As a precaution, the airline has canceled between 80 and 90% of the approximately one thousand flights scheduled for today and has announced that more than one hundred thousand passengers will be affected.
A spokesperson for the "Verdi" union underlined that the willingness to strike is "extremely high", as the Dpa agency writes.
The union predicts that Lufthansa will probably not be able to implement even the heavily reduced flight schedule it had planned.
In Frankfurt, 80-90% of the approximately 600 takeoffs and landings scheduled for the Lufthansa core brand and for the subsidiary Air Dolomiti have already been cancelled, the agency reports.
In Munich, more than half of the flights were cancelled.
Out of around 730 of all airlines, as many as 400 takeoffs and landings are affected.
According to the airport, these are almost exclusively those operated by Lufthansa and its partners.
All Lufthansa flights arriving and departing at Berlin airport, the capital's hub, have been canceled (46 connections).
An important subsidiary of the Group, Eurowings, which offers many connections far from the two hubs of Frankfurt and Munich, says it is not affected by the unrest.
In the ongoing wage dispute, Verdi is calling for a 12.5% pay increase to at least 500 euros a month for a year and a group-wide inflation bonus of 3,000 euros.
Lufthansa, underscoring notable past pay increases, offered 13% more pay for three years and a bonus for inflation.
The next round of negotiations is scheduled for Monday.
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