British Airways axes 10,300 short-haul flights from August till end of October

As British Airways axes more than 10,000 flights over the next few months, ITV News' Martha Fairlie has the latest

British Airways has announced that it will be cutting 10,300 short-haul flights before the end of October.

The move comes just a day after the airline had announced that it would be axing almost 1,000 flights scheduled to take off in July, disrupting holiday plans for more than 100,000 passengers.

In a statement over cuts, bosses at the airline said that it could only "apologise" as it cancels thousands of flights over the next few months.

The airline has been amongst the worst hit by post-pandemic staff shortages, which have lead to crippling disruption and significant anger among holiday makers.

This latest round of cuts represents around 13% of the firms' planned flight schedule over the coming months, and currently doesn't include slashes to long-haul journeys.

Tens of thousands of passengers are expected to be affected by the latest move to cancel flights at Heathrow and Gatwick Airports.

The government has introduced a slot amnesty, which enables airlines to temporarily hand back, without punishment, any take-off and landing slots they do not have the resources to use.

Under normal rules, carriers lose slots if they do not use them.

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The company said: “The whole aviation industry continues to face into significant challenges and we’re completely focussed on building resilience into our operation to give customers the certainty they deserve.

“The government recently decided to give the whole industry slot alleviation to minimise potential disruption this summer. While taking further action is not where we wanted to be, it’s the right thing to do for our customers and our colleagues.

“This new flexibility means that we can further reduce our schedule and consolidate some of our quieter services so that we can protect as many of our holiday flights as possible.

“While most of our flights are unaffected and the majority of customers will get away as planned, we don’t underestimate the impact this will have and we’re doing everything we can to get their travel plans back on track.

"We’re in touch to apologise and offer rebooking options for new flights with us or another airline as soon as possible or issue a full refund.”