Record weekend at airport marred by bar and cafeteria strike

PALMA
PALMA airport is expecting a record weekend with regard to the number of passengers and flights being handled, far exceeding the 3'162'760 passengers handled last year.

However, this increase in passengers will coincide with a strike by bar and restaurant staff run by the concessionary company Areas, which could affect around 270'000 passengers, according to figures from AENA (the Spanish Airports Authority).

AENA's forecasts indicate that today the airport could break its record for passenger movements in one single day, as the forecast for aircraft seats being occupied is 165'532.

Between Thursday and tomorrow AENA expects the airport to handle 369'800 passengers, some 3.1 percent more in comparison with the same period last year. However, this positive situation for the movement of passengers will be counteracted by the strike by bar and cafeteria employees who work for the Areas group, which manages 25 establishments, 75 percent of the bars and restaurants in the airport.

AENA sources expressed their amazement at the attitude of the unions which called the strike, which will be repeated on every weekend in September. The strike affects 253 employees of the company.

With regard to the minimum services, the same sources said, “we don't think that we can establish a minimum service. We consider this strike to be unexpected and unnecessary, and the proposals put forward by the union representatives were impossible to accept”.

Activity in Palma airport has been optimum this summer, according to the statistics, as in May, June and July the average number of passengers using the airport had shown an increase of 3.2 percent in comparison with last year.

Although it is not known how many passengers the airport will handle during the next four months, with the volume of passengers so far Palma has handled 23 million passengers.