London:
British Airways (BA) cabin crew on Saturday began a three-day strike over pay and conditions which will ground hundreds of flights, but the airline said many of its passengers were able to fly.
Some 12,000 members of Britain's biggest trade union, Unite, walked out at midnight (0000 GMT) Friday, hours after talks between unions and BA chief executive Willie Walsh broke down in acrimony.
More than 1,000 flights are set to be cancelled in the first phase of the action, with a second walkout to follow for four days from March 27, targeted at the busy Easter holiday period.
Unite said early indications were that all its members were solidly supporting the strike.
Reports said the expected chaos at BA's hubs at London's Heathrow airport and Gatwick airport outside the capital had failed to materialise because the airline had made contingency plans for about 60 percent of passengers.
A total of 1,100 BA flights out of the approximately 1,950 scheduled to operate during the first strike will be cancelled.
But BA said it was confident of keeping two-thirds of its passengers flying, using staff who are not striking and by offering travellers seats on 22 planes leased from other European airlines.
A BA spokeswoman said the airline had "got off to a good start" at Heathrow and Gatwick.
She said: "We aim to fly as many customers as we can this weekend. At Heathrow and Gatwick we have got off to a good start.
"Cabin crew are reporting as normal at Gatwick and the numbers reporting at Heathrow are above the levels we need to operate our published schedule.
"This is the biggest contingency plan we have ever launched."
In December, BA won a legal battle to prevent a 12-day strike by cabin crew over Christmas and New Year after a judge ruled that a ballot of staff by Unite was invalid.