Ryanair’s O’Leary warns against air traffic control strikes as flight chaos looms

Air traffic control strikes forced Ryanair to cancel 1100 flights last month but it still flew 12.6 million passengers, 7% higher than the same time a year ago.

The Irish airline, which is facing its own threat of pilots’ industrial action, said more than 210,000 customers had their flights cancelled in June.

This was because four weekends of strikes combined with air traffic control staff shortages in the UK, Germany and France.

Michael O’Leary’s airline called for “urgent action” to stop more industrial action “disrupting the travel plans of millions of Europe’s consumers this summer”.

Ryanair’s load factor was a strong 96% last month, meaning only 4% of its planes’ seats flew empty.

But Ryanair’s pilots are today balloting to go on strike as early as next week.

Pilots want the length of their time in the job to decide who gets first rights to entitlements like annual leave during school holidays, promotions and transfers between bases.