OREANDA-NEWS. Owing to the renewed strike announced by the Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) pilots' union, Lufthansa has cancelled 25 long-haul flights from Frankfurt for Tuesday, 30 September. A total of 57 intercontinental flights were originally scheduled from Frankfurt tomorrow and 32 of those are planned to depart. Of those 32 flights, 26 will be flown by volunteer pilots, two others will depart earlier and four have been deferred to the following day (Wednesday). All the details on flight cancellations and flight-departure changes are listed in the Lufthansa special flight timetable, which has been published on the www.LH.com <http://www.LH.com> website.

The Lufthansa hub in Munich will not be impacted by the strike: Flights to and from DUsseldorf and short-haul flights from and to Frankfurt will also operate as scheduled. Furthermore, flights operated by the Lufthansa Group airlines Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Germanwings, SWISS and Air Dolomiti (OS, SN, 4U, LX, EN) will not be affected either.

This fifth strike action within just four weeks will hit Lufthansa in the busiest air-traffic month of the year. Both the number of scheduled flights as well as capacities are traditionally at their highest level over the year at the end of September. Moreover, it is especially difficult at the end of the month to change crewing rosters and get pilots to volunteer for flights because planning options are restricted by the monthly limits on pilots' flight-duty hours. Furthermore, Lufthansa is barred from resorting to night flights by the stringent night-flight ban after 11 p.m. at its home base in Frankfurt.

"Even if we manage under these difficult conditions to get more than half our scheduled long-haul flights from Frankfurt off the ground with volunteer crews tomorrow (Tuesday), the walkout will again severely damage our reputation and erode confidence in our airline's reliability. The VC union's repeated resort to strike action will damage Lufthansa with unforeseeable consequences for all 120,000 employees, including the pilots", emphasized Kay Kratky, member of the Lufthansa German Airlines Board with responsibility for Operations and the Frankfurt Hub. "We apologize explicitly for the measures taken by the VC union, which is the only collective bargaining partner at Lufthansa intent on uncompromising and inconsiderate pursuit of its individual interests."

Passengers whose flights have to be canceled due to the strike can rebook or cancel their flight free of charge. Furthermore, all passengers scheduled to fly tomorrow (30 September) with Lufthansa or any of the Group airlines from or to Frankfurt may also re-book a flight once at a later date during the present year free of charge.