SAS scrambles to bring tourists home as strike hits more flights

SAS cancelled almost 70% of its flights on Friday as it scrambled to bring home thousands of tourists stranded overseas by a pilot strike that has deepened a financial crisis. The Scandinavian airline has been forced to cancel hundreds of flights since Monday when talks with pilots over a new collective bargaining agreement collapsed. A further 181 were cancelled on Friday, flight tracker FlightAware's data showed. SAS, whose biggest owners are Sweden and Denmark, has filed for US Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. It held a first court hearing on Thursday in a process which may take up to a year. As travel rebounds from pandemic lows, strikes and staff shortages are forcing airlines to cancel thousands of flights and causing hours-long queues at major airports across Europe. Loss-making SAS has estimated the strike by some of its pilots is costing $10m to $13m a day. "I'm with the back against a wall," SAS CE Anko van der Werff said of talks with the unions, adding that their relationship needed to follow a Scandinavian model, where labour deals are typically struck on an industry-wide basis. "I am also not in a position to sign a deal that will prevent investors from coming in. If we get no investors, then we're (going) nowhere," van der Werff said. While SAS has contended with repeated strikes over the past decade, the industry-wide negotiations adopted in other sectors in Scandinavia has tended to limit conflicts. Striking pilots have said they would consider pay cuts, but cannot accept SAS hiring new pilots through two new subsidiaries, under what unions say are worse terms.<br/>