By Jean Christou
MAVERICK pilots who have disrupted Eurocypria flights in a row with management have not ruled out doing it again, a representative said yesterday.
But the majority of the charter firm’s pilots have condemned the actions of a handful of captains seconded from Eurocypria’s parent company Cyprus Airways (CY).
The Eurocypria pilots, who have formed their own union under the umbrella of Sek, are angry at being tarred with the same brush as the CY imports causing the trouble, and accuse them of trying to close down the company for their own financial gain.
Of the 35 pilots who work at the low-cost airline, 17 are captains and the remainder are first officers.
Ten of the captains are members of the CY pilots union, Pasipy, and were promoted from Cyprus Airways to Eurocypria as part of a deal to keep the charter firm “Cypriot”.
The remainder of the pilots, including the other seven captains, are original Eurocypria stock, who believe a clique of three or four of the ten CY pilots want to ruin the charter firm.
On at least four occasions — two in the past fortnight alone involving Dublin — members of the same ‘clique’ have disrupted flights carrying hundreds of tourists.
In one case, the Irish passengers were taken to Athens instead of Larnaca.
Furious tour operators have threatened to ditch the charter firm, which lost hundreds of thousands of pounds by having to send fresh crews to bring stranded tourists for their holidays.
The pilots involved and their union Pasipy claim that they are not allowed to work more than twelve and a quarter hours during a single shift.
They blame the disruption on bad scheduling by Eurocypria management on the Dublin run, which is reportedly plagued with problems on the ground that consistently delay flights.
Pasipy claims its members’ refusal to overshoot the time-limit is motivated by concern for passenger safety; management counter that pilots have the discretionary power to extend their shift time by an extra three hours.
But Pasipy representative Andreas Constantinides said that discretionary power should only be used in extreme cases, and not in response to routine delays, such as those at Dublin Airport, where Eurocypria pilots have just one hour on the ground before the return flight.
“Captains have on several occasions put in reports about delays on the ground at Dublin, but nothing has been done,” Constantinides said yesterday.
“I can’t say for sure if there will be more delays. If things improve in Dublin, planes will not be delayed, but if things remain as they are it could happen again.”
A source close to Eurocypria management rubbished Pasipy’s claims on the Dublin delays. “In the last incident, the pilot was given four slots from which he could have flown out, but he delayed the departure each time,” the source said.
The source admitted that Eurocypria did have a tight schedule, but said this was the lot of a low-cost charter airline.
And management at Cyprus Airways believes those pilots promoted from first officer at the national carrier to captain at Eurocypria have a hidden agenda.
“The point is that they want Eurocypria closed so as to go back to Cyprus Airways as captains to get more money,” the source said.
Some Cyprus Airways pilots are among the highest paid people on the island. Salaries at Eurocypria are only 60 to 70 per cent of those paid at CY.
“The aim is to eliminate Eurocypria as a separate company and have it brought back under the control of Cyprus Airways so they can control the promotions in the charter company,” the source said.
The source was referring to a recent unresolved row involving vacancies for captains at Eurocypria.
Pasipy wants the top jobs to go to CY pilots by claiming seniority over their Eurocypria colleagues, while Eurocypria staffers say the promotions should be made from within the charter firm, since it is a separate company.
“They (CY pilots) are using these flight disruptions as a way to force the company to give in to their demands,” a Eurocypria staffer said.
“There has never been a case of a plane being left abroad by any of the original Eurocypria staff, except in the case of a breakdown.”
The Eurocypria pilots say they can do little to prevent the disruptions by their CY colleagues. They say they have tried to have the culprits put on shorter-haul flights to eliminate the “12-hour shift” problem, but the vast majority of the charter firm’s flights are long haul.
“To resolve the problem either Dublin has to move near to Cyprus or Eurocypria has to buy a Concorde,” the staffer said.
“There is little we can do except shout about the fact that we are not part of it.”
