By April Lanux

Flights have been cancelled in Italy’s major airports due to nationwide strikes and a fire on Wednesday morning.

Major airports in Italy already began cancelling flights on Tuesday in preparation for a nationwide day of strikes.

Now, all air traffic at Ciampino Airport has been suspended due to a small fire that broke out on Wednesday morning.

This fire is the latest disruption to Italy’s planned flights after airport handling staff organised a 24-hour union walkout due to ongoing disputes.

Some trains and public transport in Milan and the rest of the Lombardy region have also been affected by a 23-hour strike action.

Flying through Italy today? Expect cancellations and delays

Rome’s second largest airport, Ciampino Airport, has had to suspend all flights after a small and already extinguished fire just broke out inside the tower of ENAV, the Italian Air navigation service provider. This was first announced by the NAV (Ente nazionale di assistenza al volo), the company that manages Italian air traffic.

This event comes after most of Italy’s main airports, including Milan Malpensa, Rome Fiumicino, Naples, Catania, and Venice, have had to cancel flights due to a nationwide strike, including four ITA Airways international flights, and a regional train strike in Lombardy.

More flights could be cancelled during the day, and ITA Airways have advised passengers to check the status of their flight before heading to the airport.

What’s the reason for Italy’s travel strikes?

Handling staff from companies associated with Italy’s largest aviation association, Assohandlers, have walked out for 24 hours due to ongoing disputes over pay and working conditions. The unions are demanding better working hours, higher wages, and more benefits for ground staff.

Airport handlers manage many of the vital services at airports, and in the past, such as the Belgium strike in January, have had a significant impact on airport logistics. As well as flight cancellations, passengers may have delays in receiving their luggage at their destination of arrival.

Some trains and public transport in the Lombardy region are also expected to be affected by strikes today, organised by the Orsa Ferrovie union who planned the industrial action due to unresolved labour regulation and financial compensation issues.

The regional railway company Trenord has said that this could affect all Lombardy train services, including regional, suburban, airport, and long-distance trains.

For any airport shuttle trains that are cancelled today, the company says that they will put on buses to run between Milan Cadorna and Malpensa Airport.

Are passengers entitled to compensation due to a strike?

Under EU law, if a flight is cancelled, the airline has to offer your a refund or an alternative flights.

If your flight is delayed, you may be entitled to refunds for unplanned expenses, such as food and accommodation.

Contact your airline or travel agent to claim your refunds, though beware it can take months for your money to arrive.

According to EU law, rail passengers within the bloc are also entitled to compensation.

If your train is delayed but you choose to travel anyway, you may still be eligible for a partial or full refund. This usually depends on how late your train arrives at its destination.

If your train is delayed by more than 60 minutes, you can choose not to travel and will receive a full refund for your ticket.

Alternatively, you can choose to travel at a later date.

By Richard Thompson

It’s the story you never want to have to cover as an aviation reporter. Last week, we saw the first fatal crash of a U.S. airliner in almost 16 years when an Army Black Hawk helicopter collided with an American Airlines regional jet over the Potomac River near Reagan National Airport.

Nearly 70 people died – there were no survivors – and every life lost is nothing short of its own individual tragedy.

In the face of such tragedy, it’s important to do a few things.

An official, thorough investigation is underway and the National Transportation Safety Board, which is leading the inquiry, is the gold-standard investigative body for the aviation industry. The truth about exactly what happened last week, and how, will come out. In the meantime, speculation on the internet or from the analyst class does nothing to help or bring back the people we lost.

Second, we should trust and take comfort in the investigative process.

In the U.S., we’re very lucky that this kind of tragedy is exceedingly rare. The fact that, as an aviation reporter, I’m not writing about disasters like what happened on Wednesday on a regular basis is a testament to how safe flying really is in this country. It wasn’t always that way, but it’s become so safe only because the airline industry as a whole has a sort of unofficial mantra that no one dies in a plane crash in vain.

Airlines, aviation accident investigators, manufacturers, flight crews, and everyone else who has made any contribution to the industry see every tragic loss as a learning experience. It can’t undo the devastation of a crash, but it can learn from each tragedy to improve the safety record for every future flight.

Every accident deserves, gets an investigation

As William J. McGee, senior fellow for aviation and travel at the American Economic Liberties Project, told me in my reporting on the immediate aftermath of Wednesday’s crash, the Federal Aviation Administration exists because the government and the airline industry tried to improve their safety records more than half a century ago.

“The reason we have an FAA is President Eisenhower (signed it into law) in 1958, in response to a midair collision over the Grand Canyon in 1956,” he said.

In that crash, a United Airlines Douglas DC-7 and a Trans World Airlines Lockheed Super Constellation collided over the Grand Canyon in uncontrolled airspace. Under the rules in effect at the time, crews on both planes had a responsibility to see and avoid other aircraft, but neither saw the other aircraft in time to avert the collision.

It was the first commercial aviation disaster to surpass 100 deaths and led to major reforms in how air traffic was controlled.

In the decades since the pattern in the industry has been the same.

An investigation is conducted after every accident. Professionals from across the industry participate and advise as they can. Investigators make recommendations, which stakeholders generally accept and implement.

No rash responses

One of the first aviation tragedies I covered professionally was Southwest Airlines Flight 1380.

In that incident, the engine on a Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 broke apart mid-flight. A piece of the engine was flung into the aircraft, destroying a window, which led to a rapid decompression of the cabin that killed one passenger.

The NTSB ultimately recommended inspections and a redesign of the engine cowling (the exterior part of a jet engine) to ensure a similar failure can’t happen again.

A few months later, Boeing’s long stint under the safety microscope truly began when back-to-back 737 Max crashes happened overseas, killing hundreds.

Most recently, another 737 Max lost a section of its fuselage during a flight. While there were no fatalities in that incident, it still underscores how the industry responds.

All of these 737 incidents, along with every other incident in commercial aviation, get the same treatment: a thorough investigation that ultimately leads to official recommendations for improvement.

While Boeing has faced criticism for its slow response, in some ways, slowness is part of what makes the process work. Safety doesn’t come from rash responses. It takes deliberative, well-thought-out plans to make meaningful improvements to an already-safe system.

In the immediate aftermath of Wednesday’s disaster, the Federal Aviation Administration closed two helicopter corridors near the DCA airspace that may have been implicated in the crash. It’s a sensible first response, but it remains to be seen what the investigators ultimately recommend as a long-term fix.

There’s not really much else to say at this point. The whole nation mourns the victims of Wednesday’s crash, and we all eagerly await news about how aviation will get safer as a result.

For now, we can and should all take comfort in that. The process will play out, and in the end, flying will inevitably be made safer in response to this tragedy.