WARSAW (Reuters) -Poland’s Civil Aviation Authority will significantly reduce the number of flights in Polish airspace if no agreement is reached in a dispute over air traffic controllers’ pay and conditions, European air safety body Eurocontrol said on Friday.
The disruption, affecting not only flights to and from Poland but also those passing through the country’s airspace, could start on May 1, the day after the end of the notice period of air traffic controllers who chose to quit rather than accept new working regulations they say threaten safety.
“As of 1 May, the Polish CAA will implement a flight cancellation programme to significantly reduce the number of flights into/out of Polish airspace,” Eurocontrol said in an emailed statement.
“It is anticipated that there will be enough controllers for the approach to Warsaw airports to operate… with a total capacity of around 170 flights. The two Warsaw airports were expected to handle on average 510 flights each day in May.”
According to the Polish air traffic controllers’ union, 180 out of 206 controllers working in Warsaw chose to resign rather than accept the new working conditions. Forty-four of the 180 have already left, and the notice period of the remaining 136 ends on April 30.
Talks between the air traffic controllers’ union and the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency (PANSA) resumed on Friday in a bid to find a way out of the standoff.
A union spokeswoman said there was no chance an agreement would be reached on Friday and that talks would probably continue on Sunday.
The union says proposals including a cut in air traffic controllers’ pay and an increase the maximum number of hours they can work in a shift from eight to 12 are unacceptable.
“We are fighting for safety and for the return of a culture of work safety and this means an environment of trust, which is built, not bought,” it said in a statement on Thursday.
However, Deputy Infrastructure Minister Marcin Horala has previously said the air traffic controllers’ pay demands are not realistic given the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has reduced the fees PANSA gets from airlines.
(Reporting by Alan Charlish and Anna Koper; Editing by Hugh Lawson, William Maclean)
