STOCKHOLM Reuters -- Scandinavian airline SAS and its pilots have agreed to extend their wage talks until Monday in order to prevent a strike, a company executive told reporters on Saturday.
Nearly 1,000 pilots in Denmark, Sweden and Norway plan to strike if talks break down, according to the unions, which said SAS had said it could leave some 30,000 passengers stranded each day.
After the latest round of talks that ran through the night, all of us need to sleep, and none of us have slept for a long time, said Marianne Hernaes, SAS' lead negotiator.
A strike would come at a difficult time for the loss-making SAS as it seeks to restructure its business by taking large cost cuts, raising new cash and converting debt to equity as part of a plan to rescue the carrier from collapse.
Swedish Expressen reported earlier in the day that a deal had been reached, but SAS said the talks were still ongoing in the hopes of averting a strike.