SWISS again cancels flights due to staff shortages

At least 10,000 passengers could be affected by the flight cancellations announced just a few weeks before the summer holidays. Keystone/Steffen Schmidt

The Swiss flag carrier is planning to reduce the number of flights notably in Europe over the next few months as a result of staff shortages.

Swiss International Air Lines said about 2% of the scheduled flights to destinations in neighbouring Germany and Poland as well as to Britain and to Los Angeles would be affected.

The Keystone-SDA news agency quoted a SWISS spokeswoman as saying the reasons were “bottlenecks at air control centres, ground and airport services in Europe and at SWISS”.

Flights to Vienna over the summer months will be operated by Austrian Airlines, a sister company of the German Lufthansa group.

SWISSExternal link said about 10,000 passengers would be directly hit by the cancellations, while about 20,000 others would be offered alternative options.

It’s the second time in two months that SWISS was forced to announce flight cancellations due to personnel shortages.

Critics have accused the SWISS management of miscalculating the situation after it initially announced 780 layoffs last year but later had to review the figure to 550.