SAS braces for pilot strike as midnight deadline nears

Seventy thousand travellers with SAS will see their flights cancelled Friday unless negotiators agree a last-minute deal to stop nearly all of its around 1,500 pilots going on strike after midnight, the carrier said Thursday. Swedish, Danish and Norwegian pilot unions earlier this month called a strike if there was no agreement on wages and other terms after an earlier round of talks broke down without the parties finding common ground. National mediators in the 3 countries have been trying to broker a deal since last week between delegations of the 2 parties. A SAS spokeswoman said negotiations were still ongoing. Should a strike last through the weekend, around 170,000 travellers would be affected in total, she added. <br/>