Over 100,000 Ryanair passengers to be hit by delays and cancellations as French strikes loom

Jet-setters will see their travel plans affected as members of the SNCTA walk out from Tuesday, October 7, until the morning of Friday, October 10.

The disruption will not just affect planes heading to and from France, as overflights - aircraft using French airspace to reach their final destination - will also be impacted.

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This means those travelling to and from Spain, Italy and Greece could also have their journeys disrupted.

Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary told Sky News the industrial action would cost the airline around £20m, a sum the company could afford to swallow.

But he admitted his customers would be worse off, and urged them to complain.

The airline CEO accepted the rights of French workers to strike but called for overflights to be protected, claiming their disruption would be an abuse of the free single market.

"That's about 100,000 passengers who will have their flights cancelled needlessly next Wednesday and Thursday," Mr O'Leary said.

"On any given day at the moment, we operate about 3,500 flights and about 900 of those flights cross over French airspace and about two thirds of those, around 600 flights, are cancelled every day there's an air traffic control strike.

"The UK is the country whose flights get cancelled most because of the geographic proximity to France."

Mr O'Leary believed flights could be saved if Eurocontrol, a civil-military organisation that supports air traffic management across Europe, stepped in to oversee the airspace.

If they did, the disruption would be limited to "local French flights, not flights from the UK to Spain or from Italy to Ireland".

He also called on the government to "put pressure" on the EU Commission and the French authorities to protect overflights next week, but added that they "don't care about the travelling public and they won't get off their arses".

A Department of Transport spokesperson said: "Airspace is sovereign, and it is for each state to decide how best to manage their own.

"We know strikes can cause disruption for passengers and airlines and airports have robust resilience plans in place to minimise their impact."

Passengers using EasyJet, British Airways, Vueling and Lufthansa flights could also face disruptions.

But the full impact of the strikes will not be known until next week, as airlines tend to avoid cancellations until the action begins.

Passengers who are due to fly next week have been told to keep an eye on the status of their flight on the airline's website or app.