Cable damage on a Frankfurt construction site led to chaos at Lufthansa on Wednesday. Computer systems failed and there were delays and cancellations for thousands of passengers connecting through the Frankfurt hub. There, 242 of around 1,000 planned flights were canceled by the early evening. Passengers were asked to transfer to the train.
In the afternoon, the airport was reopened for landings after a three-hour closure. In addition, the company began to restart the computer systems. “We will feel the effects throughout the day,” said a spokesman. For Thursday, a largely normal process is expected again.
There is also a threat of flight cancellations nationwide on Friday: the Verdi union has called for a all-day warning strike at most major airports in Germany. The background are several collective bargaining conflicts.
Verdi has called for work stoppages at Munich, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dortmund, Hanover and Bremen airports. The airport association ADV assumes that the warning strike on Friday will lead to a good 2,340 flight cancellations in domestic and international air traffic. Passengers would have to be prepared for significant impairments. “More than 295,000 passengers become the plaything of the Verdi strike tactics,” criticized the association.
After the strike was announced, Frankfurt Airport ceased regular passenger operations on Friday. This will not be possible because of Verdi’s warning strike, said a spokeswoman for the operating company Fraport. In addition to Germany’s largest airport, Munich, Hamburg and Stuttgart also announced that they would stop regular flight operations on Friday. Verdi had called for work stoppages at Munich, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dortmund, Hanover and Bremen airports.
According to the company, the Lufthansa problems on Wednesday were triggered by construction work on an S-Bahn line in Frankfurt. According to Deutsche Telekom, four fiber optic cables were severed by an excavator on Tuesday.
According to the company, the Lufthansa problems on Wednesday were triggered by construction work on an S-Bahn line in Frankfurt. According to Deutsche Telekom, four fiber optic cables were severed by an excavator on Tuesday.
Since Wednesday morning, Lufthansa’s computer systems were no longer operational in Frankfurt, among other things for boarding. It was initially unclear why the disruption occurred with a time delay. According to Telekom, two affected cables were repaired overnight.
flights diverted
A crisis team met at the Lufthansa headquarters at Frankfurt Airport. Air traffic control blocked Frankfurt for landings so that the hub would not fill up with machines. Flights would be diverted to Nuremberg, Cologne or Düsseldorf, for example, said a spokesman for air traffic control. Shortly thereafter, Lufthansa canceled all of its flights from Frankfurt.
A Lufthansa spokeswoman said they were working intensively on a solution. The IT problems mainly affect Frankfurt. At the other group hubs, operations are largely running normally, the spokeswoman said. Only one flight was canceled in Zurich, namely the one to Frankfurt. It is not correct that all flights worldwide have been canceled.
There was initially no blocking for the second Lufthansa hub in Munich. International flights were also affected by the landing ban in Frankfurt, so that numerous transfer passengers missed their connections.
How many flights are affected was unclear in the early afternoon. Passengers and planes were backed up in Munich and at Frankfurt Airport. The passengers were also not allowed into the waiting machines by means of a tally sheet because, according to the staff, important information about the departure was missing.
According to Deutsche Bahn, “a cable in a cable bundle belonging to Telekom AG was severed by a contracted construction company around 7 p.m. at the construction site for Frankfurt’s S6 line”. The railway apologized to the affected passengers for the inconvenience.
warning strike on Friday
Tens of thousands of flight passengers have to be prepared for cancellations and delays on Friday. The Verdi union announced on Wednesday night that it would then paralyze the airports in Munich, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dortmund, Hanover and Bremen all day – thus expanding the wage dispute in the public sector at airports. The employees of the operating companies are often paid according to the collective agreements of the municipalities.
The warning strike is scheduled to begin early Friday morning and end on Saturday night. Aid deliveries to the earthquake victims in Turkey and Syria are said to be exempt from the strike.
The Munich Security Conference is working on being able to guarantee the arrival of the conference participants. “Hundreds of decision-makers from all five continents have already confirmed their participation,” said a spokeswoman on Wednesday. The conference is considered the most important meeting of politicians and experts on security policy worldwide and begins on Friday.
With the now continued warning strikes, the employees want to give emphasis to their demands in the collective bargaining dispute between the federal and local governments. In addition to the public service, there are local negotiations for ground handling services and a nationwide round of collective bargaining for aviation security.
