Lufthansa Strike Gets Suspended

It now seems that the pilots at Lufthansa, the German flag carrier, have chose to return to work after just one day of striking. This puts an end to the planned four day strike. The pilots trade union, Vereinigung Cockpit, agreed to resume talks with the airline.

Since talks are being restarted, no further action will be taken until March 8th the union has confirmed. As many as 4,000 pilots at the German airline chose to leave their job in protest over perceived threats to job security. Some 900 flights had to be canceled yesterday across the Lufthansa network.

Pilots are right now concerned that Lufthansa may attempt to cut costs by outsourcing posts to European subsidiaries. Concerns have been heightened following recent deals with Austrian Airways and British Midland Airways.

Vereinigung Cockpit said that it is prepared to resume talks with the airline. Lufthansa had warned that the strike would cost some £22 million a day. Even the German transport minister, Peter Ramsauer, warned of untold damage to the airline’s reputation and even possible consequences for the nation’s economic recovery due to the strike.

Despite the fact that pilots are returning to work, Lufthansa warned of modified timetables that would run in place for Tuesday and Wednesday. However they do expect Wednesday to have more of a normal schedule plan.

Any passengers that are experiencing delays on domestic flights will more than likely be offered alternative rail transport. The ones that are seeing heavy delays on international flights may be offered travel with Star Alliance partners. It is not clear how many people will be given this choice.