Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport poised to cut summer flights -Telegraaf

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport is set to cut the number of flights that it will be able to handle during the summer travel season in light of continuing labour shortages, De Telegraaf newspaper reported on Thursday.

A spokesperson for the airport could not confirm the Telegraaf report, which cited political and industry sources.

“We are still in consultation with all the airlines and tour operators to see what details we can share about cancelling flights or fewer travellers at the airport,” this summer, Dennis Muller said, adding the airport was expected to issue an update on Friday morning.

“For now there is no news.”

Airports around Europe have suffered from labour and logistics issues as passenger travel surged following the end of COVID-19 lockdowns. Airlines including Lufthansa and easyJet have already announced plans to reduce flights this summer.

A spokesperson for KLM, the Dutch arm of Air France-KLM, said KLM would not comment until Schiphol discloses its plan.

Travel at Schiphol, one of Europe’s busiest airports, has been disrupted frequently since April due to shortages of security workers and baggage handlers. Hundreds of flights have been cancelled, and long lines have become routine.

In May, the airport said it was trying to push some traffic to regional airports and was considering a forced flight schedule reduction as a “last resort”.

Germany’s Lufthansa intends to cancel 900 domestic and European flights at its hubs in Frankfurt and Munich in July, on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, 5% of capacity. Its budget carrier Eurowings is dropping hundreds of flights for the same period.

EasyJet in Germany will drop around 12 flights per day to and from Berlin airport – a total of 1,000 – from June 1 to Aug. 31.

Air France-KLM’s budget subsidiary Transavia has said it will reduce its summer schedule by around 500 flights due to its own labour shortages.

(Reporting by Toby Sterling. Additional reporting by Klaus Lauer in Berlin; editing by David Evans)