Unionized pilots of South Korea's flagship carrier Korean Air have voted in favor of a strike.
 
Korean Air's pilot union said Friday that some eleven-hundred members, more than a majority, agreed to strike after wage negotiations fell apart.
 
The pilot union asked for a 37-percent wage hike last year, while the management offered an increase of one-point-nine percent. 
 
The pilots have been deliberating for the past few weeks on whether to go on strike. 
 
The union has decided not to immediately launch a strike, and instead start with a low-level walkout and increase the degree of its action depending on negotiations with the company.
 
The government designated the airline industry as "critical to public interest" in 2008. Therefore, even if the pilots strike, 80 percent of the essential workforce must be maintained to continue flight operations.