British Airways cancelled at least 77 short-haul flights at Heathrow Airport on Thursday at the peak of its summer holiday season due to a dispute between workers and management at an airline catering firm, Reuters reported. The airline has cancelled 77 outbound short-haul flights and their corresponding return legs, many of which will not fly back to the UK on Friday, a BA spokesman said. Some 14 aircraft due to land at Heathrow on Thursday afternoon have been diverted to other UK airports, he added. It was not clear how many of those were short-haul or trans-Atlantic flights. The spokesman said earlier that around 1,000 BA baggage handlers have also stopped work during the dispute. The cancellations came as the disruption at the world's busiest international airport intensified after BA suspended check-ins for its passengers at terminals one and four as a result of the dispute involving the Heathrow Airport caterer, Gate Gourmet. Around 100,000 passengers fly daily with the airline during August. Hundreds of flights by British Airways, Europe's third-largest airline, left London earlier in the day without meals on board for passengers. BA said it was contacting passengers to warn them about the situation before their flights. Passengers caught up in the disruption earlier in the day, prior to the cancellations, were provided with food bags or vouchers at the airport before boarding flights. The dispute intensified Wednesday when Gate Gourmet sacked around 350 workers who went on strike over the company's decision to hire seasonal workers, unions said. A Transport & General Workers Union (TGWU) spokeswoman said the union was seeking further talks with Gate Gourmet and wanted to see the workers reinstated. A Gate Gourmet spokesman was not available for comment However in a release issued on Wednesday, Gate Gourmet said the strike action, following more than 30 meetings between management and the union, had put the jobs of 2,000 of its workers at Heathrow under threat. "These actions not only jeopardise the livelihoods of our entire workforce at Heathrow but also the services of major airlines and their customers," Managing Director Eric Born said in a statement. He added: "If we don't change, the company will not survive and there will be no future. We now have to take control of this situation swiftly, which may lead to restructuring to avoid the total collapse of the company." BA shares closed down 1.3 percent at 292-1/4 pence.
