Travellers in Germany suffered a chaos last Tuesday as more than 1,100 flights were cancelled as public sector airport workers went on strike to demand higher pay, news wires reported. With nearly 700 flights grounded at Frankfurt Airport, 400 flights affected in Munich, and dozens more cancelled in Cologne and Bremen, over 100,000 passengers were forced to change their plans.

Public sector workers, including bus drivers and hospital staff, have staged weeks of intermittent strikes across Germany, but airports had not been affected until last Tuesday. Verdi, a union that represents 2.3m public sector workers in Germany, said that airport staff, including security guards and firefighters, were striking at the four airports.

The union is calling for a 6% annual raise for its workers and was using the strike to promote its cause ahead of negotiations last Sunday. “The economy is booming and federal and state tax revenues haven't been this high in a very long time. Allowing public sector workers to share in this favourable economic development is not only fair, it secures the future of the public sector,” the union said in a statement. Lufthansa countered that it was “completely unacceptable for the union to impose this conflict on uninvolved passengers.”