Despite the nomination of two conciliators and the promise of the unions not to strike during the weekend in order to give a chance to negotiations with skeyes management, Belgian airspace will be closed again tonight between 01:30 and 04:30 local time (UTC+2).
Actually, two air traffic controllers manning the Canac2 air traffic centre called in sick: one for already a few days and the second since this afternoon. As there are no reserves for night shifts, the airspace above Belgium up to 24,500 feet will be closed for three hours, as announced by Eurocontrol (left picture).
The main victim of this closure will be Liege Airport, which handles a lot of freighter aircraft during the night, and accessorily Brussels Airport which receives a small number of such freighters.
Last week, the CEO of Liege Airport Luc Partoune complained to skeyes about being too severely impacted by the strike actions of air traffic controllers and threatened to ask for privatisation of air traffic control in Belgium.
