Nearly 600,000 holidaymakers’ journeys are at risk from planned Ryanair cabin crew strikes across Europe in the coming days, according to new independent data.
Analysis of the impact of the proposed strikes, by travel intelligence provider Mabrian, said that almost 600,000 people – flying from Belgium, France, Italy, Spain and Portugal – could see journey disruption in just three days.
This, it said, would account for more than 3,000 flights.
Spain will be the worst affected market, according to Mabrian, potentially accounting for around 300,000 scheduled seats on more than 1,500 flights. Mallorca would be the most affected destination within Spain, Mabrian added.
“Whilst in normal times some of those passengers might still travel via alternative means or rearrange for another date, this time it looks like many will have to give up their plans permanently due to other airlines such as easyJet cutting its schedule and also likely to have a strike soon, airport security delays across Europe, and a national rail strike in the UK,” said Carlos Cendra, director of sales and marketing at Mabrian.
“Every journey less is a shame for the European destinations expecting these visitors at a time when they are trying to make up for lost revenues in 2020 and 2021, facing higher staff costs and inflation all around,” he said.
“Once again, we are facing a sudden and unexpected change in the market that means that destination management organisations and tourism businesses need accurate data and information to assess the risks and reduce their impact,” Mr Cendra said.
“Over the last few years, the sector has faced a pandemic, a war and now a crisis of the workforce. I don’t think anyone any longer doubts the value of up-to-the-minute global data on tourism trends to help them make the right decisions in moments like these,” he said.
Ryanair strike action has already been seen in France; while cabin crew in Spain, Portugal and Italy are threatening walk-outs – over pay and working conditions – across the end of June and beginning of July.
Ryanair, last week, reiterated that it does not expect any significant disruptions to its flight services this summer.
Ryanair said it has reached collective labour agreements with the larger trade unions in Spain and Portugal and has an existing collective agreement in place with larger unions in Italy.
It said the agreements cover 90% of its people across Europe. The airline also said, last week, that threatened strike action is through minority representation trade unions and does not have the support of its crews.
Earlier this week, Ryanair launched 200 rescue flights – covering 19 of its routes from UK airports to mainland Europe – to facilitate stranded UK holidaymakers whose flights were being cancelled by EasyJet, TUI and British Airways.
While numerous airlines have cancelled thousands of flights, due to the chaos at many airports brought about by staff shortages and IT snags in the face of a surge in air travel demand, Ryanair is still operating more than 15,000 weekly flights across Europe and has added more than 1,000 extra flights for July and August.
