Hundreds of thousands of travelers face chaos as more than 1,300 flights are canceled across Europe because of a strike at Lufthansa

David Slotnick

November 6, 2019 6:06 PM

Reuters

Lufthansa is canceling 1,300 flights between Thursday and Friday due to a strike by its flight attendants.
The airline said 180,000 passengers would be affected.
The airline said that passengers could rebook on other flights on on trains, in the case of domestic flights. However, passengers reported problems accessing their flight details online or reaching customer service agents.
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Hundreds of thousands of passengers scheduled to fly across Europe on Thursday and Friday are being forced to find new flights after German airline Lufthansa announced 1,300 cancellations because of a cabin crew strike.

The airline said 180,000 passengers' flights would be impacted.

The UFO union, which represents Lufthansa flight attendants, said that its members would walk off the job for 48 hours starting at midnight on Thursday.

The strike comes as part of an ongoing dispute between the airline and flight attendants about pay and working conditions, as well as the union's status Lufthansa has been unwilling to recognize the union.

The airline said that it would cancel about 700 flights on Thursday, and 600 on Friday. Those flights are operated by Lufthansa itself flights operated by other carriers owned by the Lufthansa Group, including Eurowings, Germanwings, Swiss, Austrian, and Brussels Airlines, as well as Lufthansa Cityline, would not be affected.

Lufthansa said that passengers traveling on cancelled flights could rebook online, or convert their flight to a train ticket for domestic flights.

However, passengers on social media reported being unable to access Lufthansa's website to rebook flights, or to get in touch with reservations agents.

A Frankfurt court on Wednesday rejected an effort by the airline to block the strike.

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