Flights to and from Paris's main airports and several cities in southern France were canceled Tuesday as air traffic controllers kicked off a six-day strike to protest against what they claim is a lack of sufficient funding allocated for their sector, which is allegedly in dire need of modernization, Agence France-Presse reported.
While not all air traffic controllers have gone on strike, those stopping work to protest against air navigation companies want airport fees for airlines to be increased by 10 percent since the system used in the country to enhance radar monitoring and manage air traffic dates back to the 1980s, and is due to be replaced by a new system. The tools used to control air traffic are also in need of change.
Companies, however, have denied the workers' requests and instead are looking to decrease the costs, with the French government getting caught in between.
SNCTA, the country's biggest air traffic control union, decided not to go on strike following last-ditch negotiations with the government but has still echoed mounting concerns that French air navigation tools are becoming dangerously obsolete. For instance, all radar screens in the Aix-en-Provence control centre in southern France were recently changed in an "urgent" manner after 20 screens suddenly went blank over the span of 18 months.
Around 20 percent of flights going to and from several big cities in southern France, as well as those taking off from Paris to the south, Spain, Portugal, Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria, were cancelled, the country's civil aviation watchdog said.
Ryanair has said 26 flights to and from France will be cancelled on Tuesday, while Easy Jet said 28 flights had been cancelled, although none from UK airports. British Airways has cancelled three flights from Heathrow to Lyon, Toulouse and Marseille. All three airlines said they would be making decisions day by day on the need for additional cancellations.
Eurocontrol, a European air safety organization, estimated the six-day strike would cause 830,000 minutes, or almost 14,000 hours, of delays, the Telegraph reported.
In a nation that attracts more foreign visitors than any other country in the world, the work stoppage comes at the height of the tourist season and follows a rail protest last month that affected services both abroad and domestically, and still continues to persist in some areas, according to AFP.
