Bacause of the pilots and flight attendants who participate in the illegal strike organised by two trade unions operating within the company, PLL LOT has cancelled 28 flights by far (outbound and inbound), the spokesman of the LOT carrier, Adrian Kubicki informed Polish Press Agency (PAP) on Tuesday.
"Because of the illegal strike action by two trade unions operating within LOT, we were forced to cancel a total of 28 flights counted outbound and return. Most of those flight were scheduled for Monday," said Kubicki.
As Kubicki explained, if a plane does not fly out of Warsaw with passengers heading to other city, it also won't take people from that city back to Warsaw. The company counts such event as two flights on a given route.
PLL LOT had to cancel the first flight, from Warsaw to Toronto, on Sunday evening. No outbound flight automatically meant no return flight from Canada to Poland.
On Monday, 24 flight were cancelled: Warsaw-Tokyo-Warsaw, Warsaw-Seoul-Warsaw, Warsaw-Toronto-Warsaw, Warsaw-Nuremberg-Warsaw, Warsaw-Heathrow-Warsaw, Warsaw-Paris-Warsaw, Warsaw-Szczecin-Warsaw, Warsaw-Gdańsk-Warsaw, Warsaw-Zielona Góra-Warsaw, Warsaw-Hamburg-Warsaw, Warsaw-Moscow-Warsaw, Warsaw-Berlin-Warsaw.
On Tuesday, LOT cancelled a flight to Kraków and return.
Kubicki said that some 1500 passengers have been affected by the cancelled flights. He added that the company provided hotels and new tickets so that the passengers could reach their destinations as soon as possible.
"Each cancelled flight means huge losses for the company," he underscored. Kubicki reminded that in case of an illegal strike, the carrier has the right to demand compensation for losses sustained from both the organisers and participants of the protest.
The chairman of PLL LOT Rafał Milczarski said on Monday at a press conference that "for four days, with a superhuman effort, we've managed to keep the operations going which means that not a single flight wasn't cancelled due the ongoing, illegal strike". He added that "on Sunday evening, we were forced to cancel a flight from Warsaw to Toronto which means a huge loss of over 1 million zlotys".
Milczarski announced on Monday that 67 people were dismissed on disciplinary grounds for taking part in the illegal strike within the company.
According to data provided by LOT, there about 1300 flight attendants and 700 pilots working in the carrier, which additionally hires some 3000.
The strike was organised by Interunion Strike Committee and is based on voluntary and common refraining from work by the protesting employees. The Interunion Strike Committee has been selected from the boards of the two representative trade unions: Flight and Cabin Personnel Trade Union with Monika Żelazik as its head, and PLL LOT Civilian Pilots Trade Union, led by Adam Rzeszot.
The unions demand, first and foremost, hiring back the chief of Flight and Cabin Personnel Trade Union, Monika Żelazik, as well as 67 other employees, who had been dismissed on disciplinary grounds. On top of this, they demand the PLL LOT chairman's resignation.
Autor: gf / Źródło: TVN24 International, PAP