Climate activists paralyze Munich Airport for hours
Published: Saturday, May 18th 2024, 13:00
Zurück zu Live Feed
Climate protection activists blocked the airport in Munich at the start of the Bavarian Whitsun vacations, causing considerable disruption to holiday travel. From 5.19 a.m. on Saturday morning, the airport was completely closed for almost two hours, according to Bavaria's Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU). According to the airport association, more than one hundred thousand passengers were affected. Several planes that were due to land at Germany's second largest airport had to be diverted to other airports.
The activists forced their way onto the airport grounds early on Saturday morning and clung to the taxiways next to the runways. According to spokespersons for the airport and the federal police, the airport was completely closed for security reasons. After around two hours, one of the two runways was able to open, followed later by the second runway.
According to an airport spokesperson, around 1000 take-offs and landings were planned in Munich on Saturday. Due to the tight timing of flights, delays still occur in such cases, even if the runways are open again. Passengers who had booked a flight for Saturday should contact their airline in any case, he recommended.
The Last Generation group had reported on Network X that a total of six people had sat down in groups of two at various points around the airport. Numerous police officers and firefighters were on site to remove the activists. According to Herrman, the six activists and two others who had not made it onto the tarmac were arrested. They are being investigated for, among other things, dangerous interference with air traffic. They were facing prison sentences.
Climate activists cut the fence in four places at once
The Federal Police spokesman said that eight people initially tried to enter the site at four different points at the same time. The men and women had cut their way through the airport's security fence. Two of the activists were arrested in the area of the fence, while the others continued into the inner area.
As the airport spokesman explained, initially only planned landings in Munich from 5.00 a.m. were affected because take-offs are only permitted from 6.00 a.m. onwards. In the first hour of operations, eight aircraft were diverted to other airports, he said.
Munich Airport had expected a large number of holidaymakers on the first vacation weekend, with a total of around 350,000 passengers expected from Friday to Sunday. The airport planned to handle 2860 flights during this period. Overall, seven percent more flights were registered during the Whitsun vacations, the second major travel wave of the year after Easter, than in the previous year, the airport reported before the start of the vacation.
Last generation wanted to disrupt the start of the vacations at the airport
According to their own statements, members of the Last Generation had planned to enter the airport grounds to block at least one of the two runways. In doing so, they wanted to disrupt the travel traffic at the start of the Whitsun vacations.
The background to the protest action is that air traffic accounts for almost ten percent of Germany's responsibility for global warming. The airline industry is subsidized by the state by waiving kerosene tax and VAT, the activists criticized. They are calling for politicians to take more decisive action in the face of climate change. The group announced at the end of January that it would refrain from road blockades and concentrate on "places of fossil destruction" - airports were explicitly mentioned.
The group had already carried out similar actions at German airports in the past, for example in Berlin, Hamburg and Düsseldorf. There was already a blockade in Munich in December 2022. According to the authorities, an aircraft with an emergency patient on board was only able to land 20 minutes late as a result.
The new protest action triggered a wave of criticism from politicians. Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser (SPD) wrote on Platform X: "Such criminal actions endanger air traffic and harm climate protection because they only provoke incomprehension and anger." She demanded: "The perpetrators must be consistently prosecuted and the protective measures at the airport must be reviewed."
Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) emphasized: "This is not a legitimate protest, but a targeted intervention in air traffic. (...) If air traffic is not safe, people are put at risk, major economic damage is threatened and thousands of travelers are stranded." The Aviation Security Act needs to be tightened up.
The Green Minister of Agriculture Cem Özdemir also criticized: "What's the point of spoiling people's vacations? Take us politicians to task, argue, argue," he wrote on X. "But please don't destroy the most important thing we have in the fight against the climate crisis: The broad consensus in society."
Bavaria's Interior Minister Herrmann emphasized: "This was another absolutely brainless action by the climate chaotic people. Interfering with air traffic with such blockades - and this at the start of the travel season - is not only reckless, but also potentially endangers the lives of many people.
For the airport association ADV, Managing Director Ralph Beisel supported the call for tougher penal consequences.
©Keystone/SDA
German 
English 
French 
Spanish 
Arabic