LONDON – British Airways PLC cabin crew announced plans Friday to strike for seven days this month, potentially disrupting thousands of travelers ahead of the Easter holidays.

The walkouts — scheduled for three days from March 20 and another four days from March 27 — are the latest move in a long running and increasingly acrimonious dispute between BA and the union representing its 13,000 cabin crew over a pay freeze and changes to working conditions.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who is facing a tough reelection campaign soon, called on both sides to return to the negotiating table, warning that the strikes would “bad news” for the still ailing British economy.

But there was little immediate sign of that, with leaders of the Unite union accusing BA of intimidation as the airline pulled an offer it made before the latest round of talks broke down.

Unite had planned to put that offer to cabin crew for a vote before the planned strike action, pledging to call off the walkouts if it was approved. However, the union had added that the offer fell short of its demands, without divulging details, and that it would not recommend it to its members.

BA Chief Executive Willie Walsh said he would be “available for talks 24 hours a day,” but stressed that he planned to focus on looking after the airline’s customers whose travel plans are again in limbo after a planned Christmas and New Year strike was narrowly averted.

BA has been training around 1,000 workers who volunteered from other departments at the airline to stand in for cabin crew in the event of a walkout. It said Friday that it was also working to obtain seats on flights operated by rival airlines to pass on to its own customers.

It plans to operate all flights from London City airport, including long-haul services to New York. From Gatwick, it plans to operate all long-haul services and about 50 percent of short-haul. From Heathrow, it plans to operate a “substantial part” of both long-haul and short-haul schedules.

Unite stuck by a pledge not to hold a strike over the busy Easter period, after the planned Christmas walkout resulted in a public backlash against workers. But Unite assistant general secretary Len McCluskey said further action would take place after April 14 if the dispute is not resolved. BA won a court order stopping the planned Christmas strike on a technicality over irregularities in the union’s balloting of workers on the walkout.

Bob Atkinson of travel Web site travelsupermarket.com warned that customers were increasingly angry with both sides in the dispute over a number of cost-cutting measures imposed by the airline to cope with the global economic downturn.

“This strike is getting no sympathy from customers and is eroding loyalty for the BA brand and driving passengers to rivals at a time when the airline is facing record annual losses,” said Atkinson. “It’s sure to affect the long term stability of all BA jobs should it become a protracted dispute and is distracting from the real challenge of returning the airline to normal service and a profitable operation that customers can choose with confidence.”

BA has been particularly hard hit because of its heavy running costs and reliance on first- and business-class fares that have seen less demand during the recession. It argues the changes — including a pay freeze in 2010, a switch to part-time work for 3,000 staff and a reduction in cabin crew sizes from 15 to 14 on long-haul flights from Heathrow airport — are critical.

The airline said Friday it is facing two years of record financial losses after posting an operating loss of 86 million pounds ($130 million) for the first nine months of the current financial year, compared to a profit of 89 million pounds a year earlier.

“The changes we have introduced are fair and reasonable,” said Walsh. This is about securing the future of this great business. We are not going to let Unite destroy this company.”

Unite has also attacked the airline’s decision to train pilots, baggage handlers and engineers in cabin crew duties, saying that will put BA’s passengers’ at risk in emergency situations. The union said that a 21-day fast track training program is no substitute for the minimum three-month course given to permanent cabin crew.

“From my personal point of view I wouldn’t wnat to be flying on any plane not manned by experienced, trained cabin crew,” said McCluskey. “This isn’t just about pushing a trolley up and down the aisle. Our members are trained to deal with all sorts of incidents.”

CHARLESTON, S.C. – The Dock Street Theatre in Charleston’s historic district, on the site of America’s first theater, is reopening after a three-year, $18 million renovation.

The theater is known to audiences regionally and around the world for the productions staged there by the Spoleto Festival USA.

“This theater for 70 plus years served our city and really the country,” said Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr., as he conducted a tour of the renovated building.

“It became a showpiece for Spoleto Festival USA and it became in our city, with so many historic buildings, a very special part of the city’s history and its cultural and architectural character,” he said.

The original Dock Street Theatre, on what was then known as Dock Street, was built in 1736 and was the nation’s first. It burned down and several replacement structures, including a hotel, occupied the site over the centuries.

The existing building was renovated for use as a theater in the 1930s by the economic stimulus agency of that day, the Works Progress Administration.

But after seven decades the Dock Street needed everything from new wiring and plumbing to replacements for termite-damaged timbers, Riley said.

The building also had seismic upgrades for earthquake protection that weren’t included in the 1930s. Charleston was rocked by a magnitude 7.3 earthquake in 1886 that killed more than 100 people. Riley said part of the theater renovations were covered by a grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“It was a very complicated engineering challenge which required boring under the ground and basically strengthening and retrofitting and supporting the foundations,” the mayor said.

The exterior walls and stairwells were also reinforced. Other improvements include soundproofing, new dressing rooms and elevators and, a change audiences will like, cushions on the wooden theater seats.

“Every component of the building was restored,” the mayor said. “But we knew that among our challenges was to make sure when you came back in the building it would be the same building you remembered.”

The theater reopens to the public next week.

On April 1, the Spoleto Festival USA holds a gala to celebrate the opening of the theater that each year is the venue for its popular chamber music concerts among other productions.

Also to celebrate, the festival this season is staging “Flora,” the first opera performed in the American colonies, at the Dock Street.

This year’s Spoleto Festival USA opens May 28 and runs through June 13.

SAO PAULO – Nearly 50 passengers aboard an international cruise ship docked in Brazil have been stricken with vomiting and diarrhea, a health official said Friday. It was the same ship that last week was briefly placed under quarantine after hundreds of people came down with gastroenteritis.

“At least 47 passengers on the Vision of the Seas, operated by Royal Caribbean International, were stricken by what we believe are noroviruses that cause gastroenteritis,” a spokesman for the National Agency for Sanitary Vigilance said. He spoke on condition of anonymity, in line with department policy.

The ship, docked in the port of Santos, was not placed under quarantine and the nearly 2,000 passengers aboard were allowed to leave since “no one was seriously ill and there was no danger of the disease spreading.”

It was the Vision of the Seas’ first cruise since last week when 310 people came down with gastroenteritis caused by noroviruses, the spokesman said.

The ship will be cleansed again “but now that we are pretty sure that noroviruses are again to blame, we know what kind of cleaning agents to use,” the spokesman said.

Noroviruses cause gastroenteritis — a common inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract.

Norovirus typically is not life threatening and does not generally cause long-term effects. In rare cases, the elderly and young children can die from dehydration caused by norovirus symptoms.

The first case was detected Wednesday when the ship was heading to Santos, its last stop on a weeklong cruise.

Royal Caribbean spokesman Alexandre Raith said most passengers were Brazilian.

A statement by Royal Caribbean confirmed the number of stricken passengers but provided no detailed explanation on how gastroenteritis struck the same ship twice in a week.

In January last year at a port in Salvador in northeastern Brazil, hundreds of passengers on a Swiss-owned cruise ship were also stricken with severe vomiting and diarrhea caused by food poisoning.