Lufthansa pilots on Wednesday commenced a two-day strike to demand 22 per cent pay increase, the airline confirmed to journalists.

On Wednesday alone, 876 flights were expected to be cancelled, while emergency flight plan was still to be drawn up for Thursday’s annulled flights.

The airline expected 100,000 passengers to be affected by the strike, which is the 14th by pilots since pay negotiations stalled in 2014.

The pilot organisation, Vereinigung Cockpit, announced the strike on Monday as Lufthansa did not succeed in stopping the action at a court in Frankfurt on Tuesday.

Germany’s airport association, ADV, said that it expected damages as a result of the strike to run into the millions of dollars.

“This development is not acceptable and disproportionate,” Ralph Beisel of ADV told journalists.

On Tuesday, flight attendants from Lufthansa’s subsidiary Eurowings also stopped work at Hamburg and Dusseldorf airports.

Over 4,100 passengers were affected by that action.

(dpa/NAN)