A national strike in Belgium over pay and working conditions has led to the cancellation of all flights in and out of the country, halted public transport and prompted blockades outside factories, threatening to bring the country to a standstill on Wednesday. The 24-hour strike began at 10 p.m. Tuesday, with Belgium’s three main workers’ unions galvanizing their nearly 4m members — in a country of about 11m people — to stop working. Government workers also joined the strike, prompting a number of public schools, nurseries and sports facilities to close. Prison guards went on strike and were replaced by police officers in most prisons. “What we want is to tell employers, whoever they are, that we’re sick of them putting all the dough that we create in their pockets. It’s time to give some of it back to the workers,” said Robert Verteneuil, president of the General Federation of Belgian Labor, a socialist trade union with about 1.2m members, on public radio Wednesday morning. “People have a need to voice their malaise and their unhappiness with the current situation,” Verteneuil added. Workers are protesting slow pay raises, which will be limited to 0.8% over the next year, he said, and demanding that the government take action.<br/>
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The aviation system’s safety still hasn’t fully recovered from the 35-day US government shutdown that halted progress on new technology and stopped reviews of incident reports, the air-traffic controllers’ union president told Congress. US aviation was “on the verge of unravelling” when the partial shutdown ended Jan. 25. Flights were delayed into New York’s LaGuardia Airport as controllers didn’t report to work due to illness and fatigue, said Paul Rinaldi, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association. The shutdown cut off funding to more than a dozen departments and agencies. To prevent another shutdown, lawmakers must pass a compromise measure to renew long-term funding by Friday. Wednesday’s hearing before the House aviation subcommittee delved into the impact of the shutdown on air safety in the US. Installation of a new radar system designed to warn controllers when aircraft aren’t lined up to land on the proper runway was one of the programs that was temporarily halted, Rinaldi told the House aviation subcommittee on Wednesday. The new system is working at some airports, but its installation at others was halted when the FAA furloughed more than one-third of its workers as part of the shutdown. <br/>
Several lawmakers are pushing a proposal to make sure airport security screeners get paid during future government shutdowns. The lawmakers, all Democrats, said Wednesday their legislation would require that all money from security fees on airline tickets go only for aviation security. It would let the TSA use the money to pay screeners during a break in TSA appropriations. Some airports saw long lines during the recent 35-day partial government shutdown. Up to 10% of screeners failed to show up while they weren't getting paychecks.<br/>
Airlines kept passengers waiting on the tarmac a record number of times last year, despite fines from the federal government, The Points Guy (TPG) reported Wednesday. Many of those delays couldn’t be helped, having been caused by bad weather and record numbers of travellers taking to the skies. But the increase could also be because the federal government has been less than aggressive in using penalties against the airline industry, the travel website says. TPG, citing data from the US DoT's Bureau of Transportation Statistics, said 244 flights were delayed at least three hours in the first 11 months of 2018. That’s compared with 164 the previous year — and only 39 delays in 2014. The DoT has the authority to impose fines of up to $27,500 per passenger for tarmac delays that last for at least three hours on domestic flights or four hours on international flights. The agency began levying the fines in 2010 following years of consumer complaints about the practice. TPG says airlines worked to minimize tarmac delays after the government crackdown — and it’s still well below what it was before the Transportation Department started fining the carriers — but an analysis of data shows the number has been creeping higher in the past five years.<br/>
Flights in and out of Dallas were halted on Wednesday after reports of smoke in a radar facility where air traffic controllers monitor planes across north Texas prompted an evacuation, the FAA said. The FAA briefly grounded flights in and out of Dallas' two main airports on Wednesday after a report of smoke in a radar room prompted an evacuation of the air traffic controllers, the agency said. The ground stop applied to both Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, a hub for American Airlines, and Dallas Love Field, a Southwest hub. The facility affected by the report of smoke is not an air traffic control tower but a radar room where controllers monitor airspace over a large swath of north Texas. Local firefighters had cleared the smoke in the facility and the FAA lifted the ground stop after that, said agency spokesman Lynn Lunsford. "The controllers are back on position and the airspace is back to full capacity. It will likely take some time to work through the delays. Please contact the airlines for specific flight information," said Lunsford. American Airlines said 28 of its flights were diverted because of the issue.<br/>