Ryanair estimates £1.3m blow to profit from French ATC strike

Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has estimated the airline lost about £1.3 million in net profit after it was forced to cancel 700 flights because of French air traffic control (ATC) strikes this month.

Eurocontrol had already revealed that the two days of action, from July 3-4, led to costs of €120 million for the European aviation sector.

During a Ryanair earnings call for the first quarter of the 2026 financial year, O’Leary said the EU’s lack of action to protect overflights from national strikes was “indefensible”.

He said: “We were forced to cancel 700 flights and 130,000 passenger journeys.

“If they had protected overflights, particularly from the UK and Ireland, which are more susceptible to overflight cancellations when the French go on strike, 90% of those flight cancellations would have been avoided.”

Based on an average fare of €65, there was a revenue loss of €8.5 million, he said, which would equate to a loss of net profit amounting to about €1.5 million [about £1.3 million].

“There is a simple solution to this. It’s a solution already adopted by the Spanish, the Italians and the Greeks – and that is to protect overflights during national ATC strikes,” O’Leary said.

Ryanair has repeatedly called on the European Commission to take action, but O’Leary noted there had not yet been much progress.

“We still haven’t seen much action out of the Commission,” he added. “If we keep campaigning, we might get somewhere. “