Most flights cancelled on Wednesday due to strike

No passenger flights will depart from Brussels Airport on Wednesday 26 November - and all flights at Charleroi have been cancelled - due to the planned national strike.

This latest strike represents the seventh time this year that national trade union action has disrupted air traffic at the airport, with workers growing increasingly frustrated at the lack of response from the federal government regarding planned austerity measures which they say will significantly weaken social security protection.

Employees of the airport’s security service provider and baggage handlers are expected to participate in the national strike in the private sectors on 26 November.

Brussels Airport has therefore decided to cancel all departing passenger flights “in order to guarantee the safety of passengers and staff and to avoid long queues”.

Incoming flights are still possible, but the airport expects cancellations and says airlines will inform their passengers.

The disruption is expected to affect the travel plans of 275,000 passengers and cost the Belgian economy a total of €175 million, according to the airport.

The previous six strikes affected more than 100,000 passengers and cost Brussels Airlines alone an estimated €14 million. The airline has cancelled 90% of its approximately 200 flights for next Wednesday. About 20 flights remain, mainly aircraft returning to Brussels.

“At a certain point, it becomes difficult to bear,” said Brussels Airport spokesperson Nico Cardone, expressing frustration that the airport is so affected by strikes resulting from grievances with the federal government.

“We are completely outside of this. And yet, for the seventh time, we have to reduce our operations to almost zero. Sit down around the table and find solutions. And if you can’t find solutions, then find something else to do other than repeatedly paralysing the airport, the country’s second economic engine.”

Belgium’s unions are protesting against planned austerity measures, especially those related to pensions, which they say will throw the country’s most precarious populations into dire straits.

There will also be trade union actions on Monday 24 and Tuesday 25 November, affecting other transport and public services, but these are not expected to affect Brussels Airport.

At Bpost, unions are planning to limit the effect of the strikes on the postal service by not actively calling for participation.

“This is very bad timing for us,” spokesperson Mathieu Goedefroy said of the strikes, which come just before the holidays, a particularly busy time for the company.

The unions are taking that situation into account and have agreed to limit the impact on Bpost as much as possible, saying any strikers will be well covered.

As with every strike, they are also calling on volunteers from among the administrative staff to help with parcel processing.