We are flying from Washington Dulles to Frankfurt tomorrow (9 April 2026) on United, arriving Friday 10 April, then taking a DeutschBahn ICE from Frankfurt to Munich via the "fly and rail" option between United and Lufthansa. I've just received a notice from Lufthansa that UfO flight attendants on both Lufthansa and Lufthansa Cityline are calling a one-day strike for Friday 10 April in both Frankfurt and Munich. From what I can gather from various websites (https://p.dw.com/p/5BpgL) this should not affect rail travel. Does anyone on the forum have any better information? Many thanks.
Posted by
Salem, Oregon, USA
3900 posts
I don't know about the strike, but I had to use Google to find out that "UFO" is the initials for the union of flight attendants and NOT an unidentified flying object.
Hopefully one of our resident German experts will weigh in to help you, but the news source you linked says it impacts departures, not arrivals, and as far as I know Lufthansa doesn't operate trains.
Posted by
OP
Bethesda, MD, USA
21 posts
I have done some more research and it appears that the biggest impact on rail travel will be an increase of airline passengers who will try to travel by train. We have reserved seats so we should be ok.
Posted by
Schwerin
4645 posts
Lufthansa website have details about the strike:
https://www.lufthansa.com/de/en/prepare-for-your-trip/current-travel-information
"Is your flight affected by an irregularity?
Please check the current status The link will be opened in a new browser tab of your flight before heading to the airport."
Reliable news source Tagesschau reports:
"On Friday, April 10, all Lufthansa departures from Frankfurt and Munich are set to be affected by a strike from 12:01 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., as announced by the Independent Flight Attendants’ Union (UFO).
During the same time frame, CityLine cabin crew at nine German airports are set to walk off the job. These are Lufthansa hubs—meaning numerous passengers face flight cancellations. The strike will affect “all Lufthansa CityLine departures from the airports in Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Bremen, Stuttgart, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Berlin, and Hanover,” as the union announced."
My interpretation: Airports and Deutsche Bahn will operate normal, only Lufthansa and CityLine flight departures shall be affected. Best guess is that your planned incoming flight and taking an ICE train are not affected by this strike.
Trains are likely more filled up anyway by Easter week travelers. Some more switched from car to train due to high fuel prices in Germany, actual around 10 USD per gallon.
Have a good journey and please give a short feedback here.