British Airways Prepares for Strike No. 1

British Airways has set up contingency plans for Unite’s strike period of 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22 May 2010 with plans to fly more than 60,000 customers each day.

 All flights at Gatwick will operate as normal as will flights to and from London City airport during the entire strike period.

At Heathrow, British Airways has said it intends to operate more than 60% of longhaul flights and more than 50% of shorthaul flights in the first strike period. The airline will continue to fly to every shorthaul destination on its network.

The airline will operate most of its revised shorthaul schedule at Heathrow using its own aircraft and cabin crew, but will supplement its schedule by leasing up to eight aircraft with pilots and cabin crews from five different airlines based in the UK and Europe.

British Airways has also made arrangements with more than 50 other carriers so that it can rebook customers during the actual strike period onto their flights, if they had been due to travel on a BA service which has been cancelled.

Customers flying to/from Heathrow on a longhaul flight between 18 May and 23 May 2010 should check their bookings at ba.com to see if their flight is still operating.

Customers in the UK wishing to rebook their flights can contact the airline on 0800 727 800 which is a free telephone line. British Airways has opened up an extra call centre manned by staff volunteers to help customers with rebooking and refunding queries.

British Airways’ flight programme is complex, involving the combination of rosters for 13,000 cabin crew, more than 3,000 pilots and 230 aircraft operating schedules. More than 8,000 flight and cabin crew have to be in the right place at the right time, either on aircraft, at airports or in crew hotels in more than 140 cities in more than 70 countries, every day.

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