With dozens of walk-outs at Heathrow airport on the agenda, and further disruption expected from striking air-traffic controllers, airline passengers this month also face nine days of potential delays due to “the largest air force deployment exercise in Nato’s history”.
Air Defender 23, centred on Germany and managed by the Luftwaffe, will involve more than 10,000 military personnel and 250 combat aircraft from 25 nations – with at least 800 civilian planes diverted each day as a result.
These are the key questions and answers.
What’s happening?
Effectively, Nato is putting up road blocks in the sky. Large swathes of airspace above Germany and neighbouring countries will be closed to civil aircraft during the multi-national exercise – which runs from Monday 12 to Thursday 22 June inclusive (though with the weekend of Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 June off).
Civilian pilots will need to navigate around three main “clusters” where flying is restricted or forbidden at various altitudes. Each will be closed or heavily restricted for civilian traffic for several hours each day.
- North, extending into the skies above Denmark and the Netherlands.
- East, close to the Polish and Czech borders.
- South (running from Luxembourg along the French frontier, almost as far as Lake Constance
Why is Nato taking over central Europe just when millions are trying to fly to the sunshine?
The stated aim of the exercise is “on optimising and expanding cooperation among participating nations”, with manouvres modelled on a “Nato Article 5 assistance scenario”.
Article 5 means: ”If a Nato ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the ally attacked.”
In other words, the exercise has training value, but also a strongly political aspect: showing the Kremlin what would happen if, for example, Russia were to attack one or more of the Baltic republics.
The Bundeswehr (German defence forces) says: “Procedures are currently being optimised to minimise the impact on civil air traffic as far as possible.”
But travellers this month must build in yet another hurdle on the flight path to their destination.
What is the upshot for people seeking to go on holiday?
The exercise comes while the skies…
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