LONDON // Cabin crew at British Airways announced plans today to strike for a total of 20 days this month and next, threatening yet more chaos for tens of thousands of travellers just weeks after an Icelandic volcanic ash cloud shut down European air space.
BA warned that the unprecedented scale of the walkouts over a 23-day period would cause "extensive disruption for potentially hundreds of thousands of customers over a busy period".
The strike action, due to begin early next week, will also add to mounting costs for the struggling British flagship carrier in the wake of the volcano disruption and walkouts by BA staff last month.
Unite, which represents around 90 per cent of BA's 12,000 cabin crew, said it was forced to ramp up its actions in a long-running and increasingly bitter dispute over pay and conditions after BA turned down an approach by the union over the weekend.
The strike dates are May 18 to 22, May 24 to 28, May 30 to June 3 and June 5 to June 9, leaving just two days between each five-day walkout.
Unite said it approached BA after its members had turned down the latest offer from the airline on Friday, after advice from angry union leaders when BA failed to restore travel perks taken away from staff who joined in strike action in March.
Union leaders are also unhappy that BA is taking disciplinary action against more than 50 union members and has fired an official who represented cabin crew.
Unite's joint general secretaries Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley said in a statement that "cabin crew are left with no choice but to take further strike action. There can be no industrial peace without meaningful negotiations and while management victimises trade unionists and uses disciplinary procedures in a witch-hunt".
The pair said that the required seven days' notice period gave BA time to "reopen meaningful negotiations".
BA, which called its offer "very fair", said it had already begun speaking to a number of carriers about leasing in extra aircraft to support its shorthaul schedule and also obtaining thousands of seats from other airlines.
In a positive note for some travellers, BA said it planned to operate all flights to and from Gatwick as normal. At Heathrow, it plans to operate "a substantial part" of its longhaul schedule and "a number" of daily flights to every destination across its shorthaul network.
The airline said it would give more details four to five days before the strike is due to begin.
The airline said in statement that the strike call "has no semblance of justification. We are confident that many crew will again ignore Unite's pointless strike call and support the efforts of the rest of the airline to keep our customers flying."
BA has consistently maintained that the series of disputed changes to pay and conditions, including reducing the number of crew on long haul flights and a pay freeze, are necessary to cut costs after two record years of losses at the airline as the global financial crisis hit passenger demand.
The airline estimated that the two strikes by cabin crew in March over seven days cost it around £45 million pounds (Dh248m) in cancelled flights and contingency provisions, including hiring other aircraft complete with crew. The airline lost a further £180m last month when the Icelandic volcanic ash cloud grounded flights.
*AP
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The specs
Engine: 2.7-litre 4-cylinder Turbomax
Power: 310hp
Torque: 583Nm
Transmission: 8-speed automatic
Price: From Dh192,500
On sale: Now
RESULTS
Bantamweight title:
Vinicius de Oliveira (BRA) bt Xavier Alaoui (MAR)
(KO round 2)
Catchweight 68kg:
Sean Soriano (USA) bt Noad Lahat (ISR)
(TKO round 1)
Middleweight:
Denis Tiuliulin (RUS) bt Juscelino Ferreira (BRA)
(TKO round 1)
Lightweight:
Anas Siraj Mounir (MAR) bt Joachim Tollefsen (DEN)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 68kg:
Austin Arnett (USA) bt Daniel Vega (MEX)
(TKO round 3)
Lightweight:
Carrington Banks (USA) bt Marcio Andrade (BRA)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 58kg:
Corinne Laframboise (CAN) bt Malin Hermansson (SWE)
(Submission round 2)
Bantamweight:
Jalal Al Daaja (CAN) bt Juares Dea (CMR)
(Split decision)
Middleweight:
Mohamad Osseili (LEB) bt Ivan Slynko (UKR)
(TKO round 1)
Featherweight:
Tarun Grigoryan (ARM) bt Islam Makhamadjanov (UZB)
(Unanimous decision)
Catchweight 54kg:
Mariagiovanna Vai (ITA) bt Daniella Shutov (ISR)
(Submission round 1)
Middleweight:
Joan Arastey (ESP) bt Omran Chaaban (LEB)
(Unanimous decision)
Welterweight:
Bruno Carvalho (POR) bt Souhil Tahiri (ALG)
(TKO)
Jigra
Starring: Alia Bhatt, Vedang Raina, Manoj Pahwa, Harsh Singh
Cricket World Cup League 2
UAE squad
Rahul Chopra (captain), Aayan Afzal Khan, Ali Naseer, Aryansh Sharma, Basil Hameed, Dhruv Parashar, Junaid Siddique, Muhammad Farooq, Muhammad Jawadullah, Muhammad Waseem, Omid Rahman, Rahul Bhatia, Tanish Suri, Vishnu Sukumaran, Vriitya Aravind
Fixtures
Friday, November 1 – Oman v UAE
Sunday, November 3 – UAE v Netherlands
Thursday, November 7 – UAE v Oman
Saturday, November 9 – Netherlands v UAE
COMPANY PROFILE
Founders: Alhaan Ahmed, Alyina Ahmed and Maximo Tettamanzi
Total funding: Self funded
New Zealand T20 squad
New Zealand T20 squad: Tim Southee (captain), Finn Allen, Todd Astle, Hamish Bennett, Mark Chapman, Devon Conway (wicketkeeper), Lockie Ferguson, Martin Guptill, Adam Milne, Daryl Mitchell, Glenn Phillips, Ish Sodhi, Will Young
Islamic%20Architecture%3A%20A%20World%20History
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Tree of Hell
Starring: Raed Zeno, Hadi Awada, Dr Mohammad Abdalla
Director: Raed Zeno
Rating: 4/5
%E2%80%98FSO%20Safer%E2%80%99%20-%20a%20ticking%20bomb
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Ronaldo's record at Man Utd
Seasons 2003/04 - 2008/09
Appearances 230
Goals 115
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
Started: 2020
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Entertainment
Number of staff: 210
Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners
THE%20SPECS
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Qyubic
Started: October 2023
Founder: Namrata Raina
Based: Dubai
Sector: E-commerce
Current number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Initial investment: Undisclosed
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Thank You for Banking with Us
Director: Laila Abbas
Starring: Yasmine Al Massri, Clara Khoury, Kamel El Basha, Ashraf Barhoum
Rating: 4/5
Profile of Tarabut Gateway
Founder: Abdulla Almoayed
Based: UAE
Founded: 2017
Number of employees: 35
Sector: FinTech
Raised: $13 million
Backers: Berlin-based venture capital company Target Global, Kingsway, CE Ventures, Entrée Capital, Zamil Investment Group, Global Ventures, Almoayed Technologies and Mad’a Investment.
A%20QUIET%20PLACE
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RESULTS
5pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,200m
Winner: Ferdous, Szczepan Mazur (jockey), Ibrahim Al Hadhrami (trainer)
5.30pm: Arabian Triple Crown Round-3 Group 3 (PA) Dh300,000 2,400m
Winner: Basmah, Fabrice Veron, Eric Lemartinel
6pm: UAE Arabian Derby Prestige (PA) Dh150,000 2,200m
Winner: Ihtesham, Szczepan Mazur, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami
6.30pm: Emirates Championship Group 1 (PA) Dh1,000,000 2,200m
Winner: Somoud, Patrick Cosgrave, Ahmed Al Mehairbi
7pm: Abu Dhabi Championship Group 3 (TB) Dh380,000 2,200m
Winner: GM Hopkins, Patrick Cosgrave, Jaber Ramadhan
7.30pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Conditions (PA) Dh70,000 1,600m
Winner: AF Al Bairaq, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
The Cockroach
(Vintage)
Ian McEwan
How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
Shower or bath after being outside.
Wear a face mask.
Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.
If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.
On Instagram: @WithHopeUAE
Although social media can be harmful to our mental health, paradoxically, one of the antidotes comes with the many social-media accounts devoted to normalising mental-health struggles. With Hope UAE is one of them.
The group, which has about 3,600 followers, was started three years ago by five Emirati women to address the stigma surrounding the subject. Via Instagram, the group recently began featuring personal accounts by Emiratis. The posts are written under the hashtag #mymindmatters, along with a black-and-white photo of the subject holding the group’s signature red balloon.
“Depression is ugly,” says one of the users, Amani. “It paints everything around me and everything in me.”
Saaed, meanwhile, faces the daunting task of caring for four family members with psychological disorders. “I’ve had no support and no resources here to help me,” he says. “It has been, and still is, a one-man battle against the demons of fractured minds.”
In addition to With Hope UAE’s frank social-media presence, the group holds talks and workshops in Dubai. “Change takes time,” Reem Al Ali, vice chairman and a founding member of With Hope UAE, told The National earlier this year. “It won’t happen overnight, and it will take persistent and passionate people to bring about this change.”
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