British Airways is trying to counteract the shortage of flight attendants in the United Kingdom with a crew base located in Madrid, Spain. The carrier has had to cancel around 1.400 flights since the beginning of April due to staff shortages.

The sharp increase in demand is particularly important for the IAG subsidiary, because a lot of money has been lost in the last two years due to the corona pandemic. The establishment of a crew base in Madrid, Spain, is new in that the flight attendants are deployed on short-haul routes.

So far, crew bases outside of the UK are only available at a few long-haul destinations. However, the local staff is used on the intercontinental flights and not on the short-haul routes. British Airways is currently struggling to attract more flight attendants to the job in the UK. In the course of the pandemic, many jobs were cut in the cabin crew area and apparently miscalculated, because almost nobody returned, but reoriented themselves in other sectors.

In the United Kingdom, British Airways only has crew bases at Heathrow and Gatwick. The others have closed over the past decade. It is now hoped that additional flight attendants can be hired in Spain. These will then be flown to the United Kingdom and will be used there on British Airways planes.