The leaders of unions representing air traffic controllers and aviation safety inspectors warned Thursday that the partial government shutdown was hurting the safety of the nation’s air travel system, another effort by the labor movement to press Washington to put federal employees back to work. “Without a fully functioning FAA, a layer of safety is missing,” said Mike Perrone, the national president of the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists, which represents safety inspectors who are furloughed. At a rally outside the Capitol, where a crowd of air traffic controllers and other aviation workers gathered to call for an end to the shutdown, Mr. Perrone warned of the risk of sidelining FAA workers who could be inspecting planes and pilots. There is no evidence that air travellers have been put in danger so far because of staffing changes caused by the shutdown. But the union leaders made the issue of safety a central part of their argument that the shutdown needed to end immediately. “Every day that goes by that the government is shut down, safety is going to be compromised,” Perrone said. “Every day that goes by, something could occur that causes a crack in the system.”<br/>
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Disruptions to air travel are possible if Britain leaves the EU in March without a deal, the head of the leading association for airlines around the world warned Thursday. Alexandre de Juniac, CEO of IATA, said the risk to traffic flow is partly under control after the announcement of contingency plans. However, he voiced concerns about the possibility of some disruption that could involve flight adjustments and cancellations in the period after a so-called "no-deal" Brexit because current guidelines relating to air travel between Britain and the EU reflect 2018 traffic levels. "I am not concerned that there will be a major disruption, but I am concerned that there will be disruptions in the coming weeks, in the coming months because it has not been calibrated properly," de Juniac said. UK Transport Secretary Chris Grayling told the House of Commons on Thursday that there would be no disruption to flights in the event of a no-deal Brexit. The Civil Aviation Authority was working on creating a "properly functional British alternative," he said. IATA, which represents some 290 airlines, relies on open borders, de Juniac said. "When you close these borders, it's not good news for us," he said. <br/>
Airlines began waiving change fees ahead of a winter storm that’s forecast to spread snow from the Rockies east through the Midwest and – eventually – the Mid-Atlantic. By Thursday evening, United was waiving change fees for Friday travellers ticketed to fly through Denver and nine other airports in Colorado, where a half-foot of snow was possible. Southwest rolled out its own waiver, which covered travellers ticketed to fly through St Louis on Friday and Saturday. The same storm system was forecast to bring several inches of snow there. More waivers were likely to come as the storm forecasts solidified. Other major airports where measurable snow is possible through Sunday include Washington Dulles, Washington Reagan National, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati.<br/>
A one-day strike by security staff at three German airports on Thursday is causing travel chaos for tens of thousands of travellers. The ver.di union called on staff at airports in Duesseldorf, Cologne-Bonn and Stuttgart to walk off the job all day, leading to hundreds of flights being cancelled. The German news agency dpa reported that 350 flights were cancelled at Duesseldorf, 142 at Stuttgart and 131 at Cologne-Bonn. Up to 110,000 passengers may be affected only by the cancelations at those three airports, according to dpa. Other airports in the country were also affected by the strike including Berlin where 90 flights had to be cancelled at the capital's Tegel airport and another four at Schoenefeld airport. About 100 flights were cancelled at Munich's international airport, though some because of the continuing snowfall in southern Germany. At Duesseldorf airport, hundreds of security employees protested by blowing whistles and holding banners with slogans like "More salary? For sure!" The departure and arrival displays showed hundreds of cancellations while airlines were struggling to book passengers on other flights or gave out vouchers for train rides instead.<br/>
Bengaluru’s international airport is expecting passenger traffic to surge nearly 70% in an expansion over the next two years as multinational companies pour money into the city known as the Silicon Valley of India. Airport authorities laid out plans on Thursday for a nearly $2b investment that will add a new terminal and a second runway, boosting the airport’s capacity to 45m passengers per year. The population of south India’s biggest city has more than doubled since the turn of the century as banks, IT consultancies and startups set up bases, concreting over a city of trees, bungalows and lakes once favoured by the country’s retirees. The Kempegowda International Airport, already the third busiest in India with 27m passengers in 2017-18, is expecting traffic to triple in the next 10 years, said Hari Marar, the CEO of the airport. “We will be as big as Heathrow is today,” Marar said. Along with a new terminal, Bangalore International Airport Ltd is also nearing completion of a second runway, capable of handling Airbus’s A380s and operating in near zero visibility.<br/>