2,100 f lights cancelled by Ryanair
RYANAIR has cancelled up to 2,100 flights over the next six weeks – including some in and out of Dublin for today.
In a statement, the airline apologised for the decision, which will see the cancellation of ‘40-50 flights daily... to the end of October’. It said it was to accommodate annual leave for pilots and cabin crew. It claimed the decision would improve punctuality.
RYANAIR has caused chaos for travellers by cancelling up to 2,100 flights so that staff can take holidays.
In a statement, the airline said that ‘40-50 flights daily for the next six weeks to the end of October’ had been cancelled to ‘allocate annual leave’ for pilots and cabin crew and to improve punctuality.
Between 1,680 and 2,100 flights across Europe have been cancelled with the company saying affected customers had been contacted.
The move seeks to ‘improve system-wide punctuality, which has fallen below 80% in the first two weeks of September through a combination of Air Traffic Control capacity delays and strikes, weather disruptions and the impact of increased holiday allocations to pilots and cabin crew.
There have also been disruptions because staff have to take their full holiday allowance before the end of the year, rather than by April 2018, under new requirements from the Irish Aviation Authority.
This resulted in a backlog of staff seeking to take holidays.
‘Ryanair has operated at a record schedule and traffic levels during the peak summer months of July with 12.6million guests and in August with 12.7million guests but has a backlog of crew leave, which must be allocated before December 31, 2017, in order to switch to a calendar leave year.
‘These tighter crewing numbers and the impact of ATC capacity restrictions in the UK, Germany and Spain, as well as French ATC strikes and adverse weather have given rise to significant delays in recent weeks.
‘Ryanair’s on-time performance has declined from 90% to under 80% over the past two weeks... that is unacceptable to Ryanair and its customers.
‘By reducing its scheduled flying programme over the next six weeks by less than 2% of its over 2,500 daily flights, the airline will create additional standby aircraft which will help restore on-time per- formance to its 90% average.’
Ryanair’s Robin Kiely said: ‘Ryanair apologises sincerely for the inconvenience caused to customers by these cancellations. Customers will be contacted directly about this small number of cancellations and offered alternative flights or full refunds.’
Fianna Fáil’s spokesperson on transport, Robert Troy, said the decision has caused deep concern to the passengers affected.
‘I’m really very disappointed in the manner in which this decision has been carried out and communicated. Passengers intending to travel over the weekend weren’t given any warning to make alternative arrangements. ,’ he said.
Affected customers took to Twitter to vent their anger.
Requests by the Irish Daily Mail for a list of affected flights was not successful with the company only saying ‘All affected customers have been informed’.