The CEO of Ryanair, Michael O’Leary, has cautioned that travelers this summer may face flight disruptions due to the strikes of air traffic controllers across Europe. On Wednesday morning, he addressed an aviation event in Brussels and assured that the airports won’t be as chaotic as last year, when there was a sudden surge in air travel after the pandemic.
Dublin Airport declared that it has made many improvements and new arrangements to make Ireland,s biggest gateway of the year cleaner and more comfortable for passengers. Mr O’Leary expressed his belief that things will be better in 2023, but he also noted that air traffic control strikes can cause significant issues. Additionally, the NATO military exercise in Germany this June will impact airspace availability.
Mr O’Leary has been critical of the European Commission for not solving the troubles of air carriers due to air traffic control delays and strikes, which even affect aircrafts passing through a country without landing. He encouraged to keep on raising the issue and to press the Commission to take some action.
For years, airlines have been asking the European Commission to implement the Single European Skies project in order to streamline air traffic control services, which would save billions of euros from flight delays.
With a few exceptions, such as the Irish Aviation Authority and the UK’s Nats, air navigation service providers have been very isolated. Not even utilizing the same ATC computer systems, their lack of interoperability has been a large roadblock in achieving progress. The goal of forming the Single European Sky, a network of Functional Airspace Blocks (FABs) that surpass boundaries, is yet to be accomplished.
At the Airlines for Europe conference, EasyJet’s CEO Johan Lundgren mentioned that there is currently a “good demand” amongst consumers for summertime travel.
