British Air Cancels Some U.S. Flights

British Airways, faced with the threat of a three-day strike by its flight attendants, said Monday that it has canceled all service later this week between London and the Washington-Baltimore area.

The airline canceled its two daily round-trip flights to Washington Dulles International Airport from London’s Heathrow Airport for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

The airline said it has also canceled its daily round-trip flight between London and Baltimore-Washington International Airport for the three-day period. British Airways operates daily flights between London and 21 U.S. cities.

British Airways said it would restore the flights if it reaches agreement with the flight attendants before Wednesday but warned passengers that there would probably still be some disruptions in service, for at least the first day.

British Airways said stranded passengers who have already booked their flights should call the airline as soon as possible to see whether they can be re-booked on a later flight. The airline said it would try to find seats on other airlines for those passengers who could not wait to travel at a later date.

Other airlines said Monday that they would try to help stranded British Airways passengers but added that this was one of the busiest travel times of the year to London and that there were very few empty seats.

American Airlines spokesman Tim Smith said his airline was closely monitoring the British Airways situation and was working on plans to try to help stranded passengers find other flights. But Smith warned that American’s flights were already nearly full.

“It ultimately comes down to simple availability,” he said. “Right now our crews and our aircraft are very tight.”

The story was pretty much the same at United and Delta airlines.

“We’re pretty full,” United spokesman Joe Hopkins said. “June, July and August are the prime vacation months.”

British Airways had no immediate estimate of how many passengers fly its Dulles-London route each day, but it is presumed to be about the same as at United, which flies about 1,000 passengers daily.

British Airways, which flies more than 2 million passengers a year between the U.S. and England, said it was canceling about 55% of its long-haul flights out of London’s Heathrow Airport and about 35% of its flights from Gatwick, London’s other airport.

The cancellations were made after the British Airlines Stewards & Stewardesses Assn., which represents 8,500 British Airways flight attendants, announced it would stage a 72-hour strike, starting Wednesday, if it had not reached agreement with the airline on a new labor contract. British Airways has warned the union that a strike would be a violation of its labor contract and that strikers and anyone who failed to work could be fired.

Robert Ayling, the airline’s chief executive, apologized to British Airways’ passengers Monday, calling the union’s threat “an unjustified action.”