Europe’s airlines, travellers suffer in snow

 –– Flights grounded across northern Europe 

 — BA shares down 1%, Lufthansa down 0.75% —

Snow and freezing temperatures grounded flights across northern Europe on Monday, with travellers trying to get away for Christmas set to be frustrated further with more severe weather on the horizon.
British Airways said arctic conditions would continue to cause major disruption to its operations and that more travel chaos was possible.
Over 1,000 flights at Germany's main airports were cancelled and many more delayed after up to 40 cm of fresh snow blanketed the country on Monday, though Lufthansa said it was confident it would operate a full service by Wednesday.
Air France said there were serious delays at the two main Parisian airports, Charles de Gaulle and Orly following a snowstorm on Monday morning.
Cargo operations have been hit at Charles De Gaulle with some night flights cancelled, threatening to disrupt industries such as auto manufacture which rely on just-in-time inventory delivery.

HERCULEAN EFFORTS

British Airways said London's Heathrow airport would be operating at significantly reduced capacity for several days as ground crews continued to clear snow and ice.
It said some long-haul flights and all short-haul flights after midday on Monday would be cancelled.
With only one of its two runways operational, London's mayor Boris Johnson called for a "Herculean effort" by Heathrow operator BAA and its contractors to get planes back in the air.
Britain's Met Office said it expected "freezing temperatures and light to heavy snow" around Heathrow on Monday afternoon, with further snow expected on Tuesday morning.
Shares in BA and Lufthansa recovered early losses and were 1 percent and 0.75 percent down by 1230 GMT as the Arctic blast hampered operations in one of the busiest weeks of the year for air travel.
BAA, owned by Spain's Ferrovial, expects more flights to leave Heathrow on Monday than on Sunday, despite forecasts for more severe weather, but urged customers not to travel to the airport unless they have a confirmed booking on one of the flights that is operating.

EUROPE-WIDE CHAOS

The severe winter weather could plunge British retailers into the red over their peak Christmas trading period, according to Howard Archer, the chief European economist at IHS Global Insight.
"The longer the severe weather persists, the greater the impact will be, even allowing for the fact that much of any lost production and construction activity can be made up," he said.
"However, while in normal times most of any retail sales lost to bad weather is also normally made up, this may be less the case than normal due to the proximity of Christmas."
Britain's biggest department store chain John Lewis said sales fell over 10 percent on Saturday, while France's Auchan told Reuters last week its business was being affected.
Europe's airlines were also grounded in April when an ash cloud from a volcano in Iceland made it unsafe to fly, costing airlines more than $1.7 billion in lost revenues.

CHANGING PLANS

BA said it was aiming to run as many flights as it could from Gatwick, south of London, and the smaller London City airport in the east of the city.
A BA spokeswoman said it was too early to give any estimates on the likely cost of the disruption. The airline said it lost around 15 to 20 million pounds a day in passenger and freight revenue during the Icelandic ash closure.
BA has had a tough year, with a series of strikes by cabin crew costing in 150 million pounds and the dispute unresolved.

Air travel to Cyprus disrupted

Air travel between Cyprus and Britain is disrupted because of arctic weather conditions in the UK.
Air travel at Manchester seems to have been restored and a Cyprus Airways plane is scheduled to depart at 1500 (UK time). The plane is expected to bring back to Cyprus passengers, whose flight was cancelled yesterday at Birmingham.
Hermes Airports Communications and Public Relations Director Adamos Aspris told CNA today that due to bad weather conditions in Europe and the UK, “changes are anticipated to continue today on flights to and from Cyprus”.
He called on travelers to contact the airlines they have made reservations with to find out the status of their flights.
According to Manchester and Heathrow websites, the first one is operating but Heathrow Airport announced it would not be accepting arrivals on Sunday, and will only manage a handful of departures as its airfield team continues to deal with the impact of yesterday's bad weather and prepares the airport for a full re-opening on Monday.
In a statement today, Cyprus Airways expressed regret for the inconvenience passengers are facing due to the weather conditions mainly at UK airports, leading to flight cancellations yesterday and today.
It said that after a Heathrow Airport Authority announcement, there will be no arrivals until 2200 tonight while some departures do not include Terminal 1 where Cyprus Airways flies from.
For this reason, said CY, passengers affected will travel when conditions allow and will be informed accordingly.
Cyprus Airways said efforts are underway to transfer to hotels passengers of yesterday’s flights who remained stranded at Heathrow Airport for many hours. These passengers will be informed on their new departure time as soon as the situation becomes clear, the statement added.
However, due to the extremely difficult weather conditions and the large number of passengers from all companies that are stranded at London’s airports, finding hotels and transporting them is very hard, the statement noted.
Passengers of yesterday’s CY flight from Stansted Airport are scheduled to leave tonight at 2020 for Paphos – Larnaca.
Passengers of yesterday’s flight CY346 which was diverted to Brussels from Heathrow will travel to London when conditions allow.
Weather conditions have also affected Cyprus Airways flights to Frankfurt, Salonica and Paris. Passengers are advised to call the CY call centre at the following number 80 0000 08 to make new arrangements.