Bad news for travelers planning to take Lufthansa in the near future. Cabin crew for the airline kicked off a second round of strikes today over pay and conditions, causing the company to cancel hundreds of flights. This follows a walk-out on Friday, which left about 26,000 passengers stranded.Lufthansa is Germany’s biggest airline, and the second-largest European airline. Trade union UFO, which represents about 2/3 of Lufthansa’s 18,000 cabin crew members, threatened full day walkouts as well as striking into the autumn or winter if workers don’t get a 5% pay increase and guarantees against temporary workers and outsourcing. Lufthansa, which is trying to implement a $1.9 billion savings program, has offered a 3.5% pay increase, and says it will not raise its offer from there. This wage dispute has gone on for 13 months. The cancellations, which grounded around 350 of the company’s 1,800 daily flights, will mostly affect service in Europe, but also carry over into places like Chicago and L.A. If the strike expands, it could cost the company over 12 million euros a day, or around 2 percent of full-year operating costs, according to Bloomberg. Lufthansa’s stock fell 1.8 percent in Frankfurt on this news in midday trading.
