It looks like Air Canada will be gradually resuming flights as of today. Hopefully this goes more smoothly than Sunday’s failed attempted at resuming flights.
In this post:
Air Canada reaches settlement with flight attendants
Last week, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), which represents Air Canada’s roughly 10,000 flight attendants, issued a 72-hour strike warning. Air Canada management responded by issuing a flight attendant lockout notice, meaning that all Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge flights were canceled as of Saturday, August 16, 2025.
Given the impact this has on the traveling public, the government tried to get involved to force flight attendants to return to work, and to undergo binding arbitration. As you’d expect, that angered flight attendants, and the union told members to defy the return to work order, and remain on strike.
There’s now an update — Air Canada has announced that it will gradually restart operations as of today, Tuesday, August 19, 2025. The company claims that this follows a mediated agreement through a process overseen by a mutually agreed-to mediator.
Mediation discussions began on the basis that the union commits to having flight attendants immediately return to work. The company isn’t yet commenting on the agreement, and is waiting for the ratification process to be complete. During any ratification or under the binding arbitration process, a strike or lockout is not possible.
Flights are scheduled to resume as of this evening, though customers are advised that it will take 7-10 days for operations to return to normal, as aircraft and crew are out of position. During this process, some flights will be canceled, until the schedule is stabilized.
Air Canada is advising only customers with confirmed bookings for flights that are showing as operating to go to the airport. Meanwhile those on canceled flights have the option of obtaining a full refund or receiving a credit for a future flight. The company will also continue to book customers on other airlines.
Here’s how Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau describes this:
“The suspension of our service is extremely difficult for our customers. We deeply regret and apologize for the impact on them of this labour disruption. Our priority now is to get them moving as quickly as possible. Restarting a major carrier like Air Canada is a complex undertaking. Full restoration may require a week or more, so we ask for our customers’ patience and understanding over the coming days. I assure them that everyone at Air Canada is doing everything possible to enable them to travel soon.”
This is great news, hopefully it all works out
Right now details are limited in terms of what the two parties have agreed to. We know that the union was opposed to entering binding arbitration, arguing that it takes away the membership’s ability to vote on a new contract.
This is one of the messier labor agreement situations we’ve seen at an airline in quite some time. In total, the airline fully shut down for nearly four days, and that says nothing of the up to 10 days that it will take for operations to return to normal.
Given that the union was so opposed to binding arbitration, I’m curious if union leaders just didn’t see a way forward that would improve their odds, or if they got some kind of a commitment for further improvements. Hopefully this new contract can be ratified soon, and things can go back to how they were before.
I have to imagine that this process will cause some bad blood between management and labor that wasn’t there before, and that this can’t be good for morale going forward.
Bottom line
Air Canada will be gradually resuming operations as of the evening of Tuesday, August 19, 2025. This comes as management and the union representing flight attendants have reportedly reached a mediated agreement, though the details of that haven’t yet been revealed.
Air Canada has been shut down for nearly four days now, after flight attendants went on strike over a contract dispute, and management responded with a lockout notice. While the government tried to block the strike within a day, the union told flight attendants to defy those orders.
Now it seems there’s finally a resolution, so let’s hope this contract gets ratified, and that the long term impacts aren’t too bad.
What do you make of this update about Air Canada resuming operations?
Everyone basically hates flight attendants. And the good thing? They did it to themselves.
Every last one of you reading this: you did it to yourselves. You have fewer qualifications than a diner waitress, yet you play all high and mighty.
We want to see you fired, poor, punished. And yes, you will still serve me my gin/tonic and you will like it. And you will say thanks.
I thought the flight would last a week! Not sure how morale will be, with binding arbitration, but one gets the sense that the sticking points are a bit icky for the company's position. CUPE played their hand well, Hajdu overplayed hers with the instant order, and now with arbitration, the adults have control again.
I'm going to bet the turning point was the government's shockingly late acknowledgement of potential unpaid labour under Canadian labour laws. At that point AC knew they would lose that one, one way or another, and the government would have likely had to have slapped a giant fine to appease public approval should they complete the investigation. Everyone will say this was a compromise (which it is ...) but objectively the union won more.
lol, unpaid. They're way overpaid.
There's 100s of applicants per job. You could offer 8 dollars an hour and no nonrev benefits and easily fill the jobs.
Yet the airline caved in the face of your "counter offer" post. You don't know what you're talking about.
Oh look, a woman with a non-argument. Thank you, Sammyline.
What we do know for a fact is there's a HUGE supply of sky waitresses and very little demand.
We don't need them. Just fire them all.
Curious if anyone has any insight on how the back to work will effect existing flights. AC has said it will take a week to get back to normal operations but I don't know what that means. For instance, I have flights booked for this weekend and next weekend. Neither of which were cancelled to this point. Is there still a chance they could be effected by the gradual return to operations? Could I be...
Curious if anyone has any insight on how the back to work will effect existing flights. AC has said it will take a week to get back to normal operations but I don't know what that means. For instance, I have flights booked for this weekend and next weekend. Neither of which were cancelled to this point. Is there still a chance they could be effected by the gradual return to operations? Could I be bumped for stranded passengers. Not a complaint, just not sure how this works. Thanks!
airlines very rarely bump confirmed passengers in order to accommodate passengers whose flight was previously cancelled.
There is enough capacity in the Canadian and US air transportation systems to clear the backlog but not necessarily on the same day.
I imagine that full flights will be the norm for anything touching Canada or nearby US cities and hubs through next Monday or Tuesday - which is about the time that AC says it will begin to operate a stable schedule.
These decisions will be made on the fly. Pun intended. Watch FlightAware, the AC app and cbc.ca. Be prepared to fly as scheduled and be prepared to spend untold hours at the airport. All medicines in carry-on!
I don't think anyone is getting effected. That would imply them getting k1lled.
They may be affected, though.
Proud of my union colleagues on this one. Clear demonstration of how as workers if we organize, bargain collectively, and stand our ground (even against an attempt at government intervention) we can win.
And before you complain about higher prices, it doesn't necessarily mean that. Any number of options are available to a company, including taking fewer share buybacks, slightly lower profits, or pay executives a bit less. In a competitive market, prices will probably...
Proud of my union colleagues on this one. Clear demonstration of how as workers if we organize, bargain collectively, and stand our ground (even against an attempt at government intervention) we can win.
And before you complain about higher prices, it doesn't necessarily mean that. Any number of options are available to a company, including taking fewer share buybacks, slightly lower profits, or pay executives a bit less. In a competitive market, prices will probably still compete with WestJet and others, but execs might not make as many millions. I'm sure the CEO hates that, but the rest of us are not too worried about it.
Yeah, gotta give major kudos to CUPE for sticking to its guns here even in the face of govt meddling - glad to see that it worked.
as they say, the devil is in the details. I suspect the government did push both on AC and CUPE to bend but CUPE would have just caved if it did not gain for some of the non-flight time compensation it is asking.
This all served as a huge, costly inconvenience to many Canadians and a big boon for Canadian airlines non-named Air Canada while US airlines have carried - and will through the weekend...
as they say, the devil is in the details. I suspect the government did push both on AC and CUPE to bend but CUPE would have just caved if it did not gain for some of the non-flight time compensation it is asking.
This all served as a huge, costly inconvenience to many Canadians and a big boon for Canadian airlines non-named Air Canada while US airlines have carried - and will through the weekend - a bunch of extra traffic they weren't counting on at the tail end of the summer season.
They just told the flight attendants that if they don't go back to work, the airline would be sold to Donald Trump.
Renamed to Air 51 and mainly used to deport immigrants.