Police and pickets clashed sparodically throughout the day yesterday as another round of talks to try and resolve the Balearics' coach strike broke down. All that came of the two hour meeting were assurances from the unions that they will try and convince drivers to operate minimum services today, when Palma airport is expected to handle around 135'000 passengers. Technically, in accordance with the law, there should have been 80 per cent minimum services, but none of the islands' coach drivers turned up for work and the entire fleet of coaches remained locked in their depots. Drivers planning on taking their coaches out on the roads had been threatened with reprisals. All of the 5'000 tourists who spent the night at the airport, split between the main terminals and the old Terminal A building, eventually left on time. The new arrivals landed with no or minimal delays only to be met with no taxis and guided to the huge taxi queues. Over 1'000 taxis worked around the clock yesterday, the majority of which had been booked by tour operators to ferry clients back and forth from the airport. However, the contingency operations mounted by the airport authority AENA and the tour operators appeared to be working yesterday, with the only delays being an average of 13 minutes long. However, tour operators admitted that today will be the crunch day and did not want to sit back on their laurels last night.
One day down, two more possibly to go...
After a chaotic night a sense of normality settled over the airport yesterday even though the coach driver's strike was still on.