The primary day of floor employees strikes at 12 Spanish airports brought about “mountains of baggage” on the tarmac and flight delays. Here is what you’ll be able to count on from the 2 totally different airport strikes going down throughout Spain this week.
Monday March thirtieth was the primary day of strikes by floor dealing with employees throughout Spain, with staff participating in walkouts at 12 airports throughout the nation.
Groundforce employees started their indefinite strike on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays (from 5am to 7am, 11am to 5pm and from 10pm to midnight), whereas staff at Menzies have scheduled 24-hour stoppages on April 2nd, third, 4th, fifth and sixth.
READ ALSO: Floor employees start Easter strike at 12 airports in Spain
So what’s been the affect of the strikes to this point and what can we count on from the remainder of the week?
Based on the union delegate at Groundforce, Rubén Guallar, the airports most affected by the strike on the primary day had been Madrid, Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Málaga and Gran Canaria, with delays to each flights and baggage.
The unions declare that to this point there was little affect to providers at Barcelona’s El Prat Airport, however there have been a number of lengthy queues that fashioned early within the morning, notably on the Lufthansa, KLM, and Air Europa check-in desks.
There have been additionally some flights delayed and lengthy waits for bags.
At Madrid Barajas, the state of affairs wasn’t any higher. There are studies within the Spanish press of very lengthy (“kilometres-long”) traces of passengers ready to have their baggage checked.
Some passengers interviewed by Spanish TV station Telecinco claimed they’d waited for as a lot as 4 or 5 hours for his or her baggage to be delivered. There have been additionally “mountains of baggage” simply ready on the tarmac outdoors.
READ ALSO: The important information to Easter in Spain in 2026
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In Málaga, the unions introduced that the primary day of the strike did trigger some delays. In the course of the morning walkout from 5am to 7am and the afternoon shift 11am to 5pm, seven flights skilled delays, three of them exceeding one hour, in response to José Manuel Álvarez, head of the Air Sector in Andalusia for CCOO and delegate for the Groundforce committee.
These had been additionally two SAS flights with delays of over one hour, in addition to an Air France departure to Paris, with a little bit over an hour’s delay, in response to union information.
It’s estimated that the stoppages have affected round 15 % of the flights from Málaga to this point.
Moreover, there have been studies of not less than 18 delays in Gran Canaria and in Palma de Mallorca.
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The subsequent strike day will happen on Wednesday April 1st. In addition to points on the above airports, there may be delays and lengthy traces at airports in Alicante, Ibiza, Tenerife, Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, and Bilbao, the place Groundforce employees are situated.
On Thursday, employees from floor dealing with firm Menzies are set to strike, affecting flights and providers in Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Málaga, Alicante, Gran Canaria, Tenerife South and Tenerife North.
These walkouts will final 5 days and might be uninterrupted (24 hours every), will might end in even longer delays.
Good Friday (April third) is predicted to be one of many worst strike days as each employees from Menzies and Groundforce will stage walkouts in any respect the airports talked about above. This might trigger important holdups to flights, lengthy waits at baggage carousels and additional queuing at examine in desks.
Menzies employees may also be hanging on April 4th, Easter Sunday (April fifth) and Easter Monday (April sixth). It’s attainable that Groundforce employees will proceed their indefinite strike on April sixth too, if no settlement is reached beforehand.
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In case you’re as a consequence of fly into or out of any of the affected airports from Wednesday via to the tip of Easter week, the final advise is to examine your flight standing frequently and arrive on the airport a lot sooner than common, notably for worldwide flights.
Airport authorities additionally advise that you just consider additional time for connecting flights, and if attainable journey with solely hand baggage somewhat than checked-in baggage, so as to keep away from baggage delays.
Unions have known as for stoppages for Groundforce staff to demand that their employers implement appropriate wage scales in response to the Client Worth Index, whereas Menzies employees even have gripes over pay and work schedules.
