French air traffic controllers' strike disrupts early summer season travel

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00:00Now around a quarter of flights have been cancelled from Paris's airports.

00:05Up to half of all flights cancelled from Nice in the south of France

00:09and a series of other cancellations across France as well.

00:12That all due to a strike by French air traffic controllers

00:16which is set to disrupt the start of the summer holidays

00:19for tens of thousands of travellers.

00:21Now unions are demanding better working conditions and more staff as well.

00:26We're going to cross live to all the airports just south of Paris,

00:29talk to our senior reporter James Andre who joins us from there.

00:32James, tell us as the day gets going there or clicks a little bit further through.

00:36It's 20 past 10 now in the morning here in France.

00:39How bad the situation is?

00:43Well look, around one quarter of the flights have indeed been cancelled here at Orly Airport

00:49and so we've been speaking to a lot of people.

00:52Now as you can see there isn't any widespread chaos here at the airport

00:55simply because most airlines were actually able to cancel these flights

01:00because that was requested by the French air traffic organisation

01:05and indeed the people whose flights have been cancelled were notified in advance

01:09so they didn't have to come to the airport.

01:11Though there are some people who were not informed and earlier on we were speaking to one lady

01:16was telling us that her mother, in fact, was trying to get back to Spain

01:20and that they arrived here, their flight was cancelled,

01:22had to change the flight to another city in Spain in order to leave today

01:26and then she'd have to have a long bus ride to her home.

01:30These are the stories we're hearing here

01:32and this is set to get worse tomorrow with around 40% of flights cancelled.

01:38Here are a few interviews we had with people here at the airport earlier on this morning.

01:43We weren't notified that our flight was cancelled

01:47so we only found out when we arrived here early this morning.

01:55At first we looked for another flight, one leaving later.

02:00But it was too expensive

02:01so we asked for a refund.

02:08There's no other way to get to Thivat.

02:11It's a no-go.

02:13Our trip is totally ruined.

02:16James, it's come, doesn't it, right at the start of the French school holidays.

02:20I mean, a lot of schools are breaking up, a few today, mostly tomorrow.

02:26Yes, absolutely.

02:28And indeed, this is what a lot of people are criticising,

02:31including the French transport minister, Philippe Tabarro,

02:34who said that in his view, well, this strike was unacceptable,

02:39that he was going to hang on to the reform that is being implemented

02:44when it comes to air traffic controllers here in France.

02:47And this is a reform that indeed plans for there to be a clock at the beginning of the shift

02:54and that indeed the air traffic controllers will have to clock in and stay at their post.

02:59Indeed, this comes after a near aerial catastrophe in Bordeaux in 2022

03:06when new two planes nearly crashed into each other.

03:09And indeed, the inquiry revealed that out of the six air controllers

03:13that were supposed to be at their post at that moment,

03:16only two were actually physically present.

03:18This is something that the authorities want to avoid.

03:21And the unions, when it comes to the air traffic controllers,

03:24are also saying that they are facing toxic management,

03:28also personnel shortage, and that they want to see a pay raise.

03:32So we have two days of strikes that are planned, today and tomorrow.

03:37The air traffic controllers, this is law, have to give a five-day notice to the airlines

03:40that they are going to indeed be on strike.

03:43So we have to see where this goes.

03:45But indeed, the minister is saying that he's going to stick to his guns and carry on with it.

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