More WestJet flight cancellations as Canadian airline strike hits more than 100,000 travelers

A strike by plane mechanics forced Canada’s second largest airline, WestJet, to cancel hundreds more flights Sunday, upending plans of roughly 110,000 travelers over the Canada Day long weekend and prompting the carrier to demand action from the federal government. Some 680 workers, whose daily inspections and repairs are essential to airline operations, walked off the job Friday evening despite a directive for binding arbitration from the labor minister. “WestJet is in receipt of a binding arbitration order and awaits urgent clarity from the government that a strike and arbitration cannot exist simultaneously; this is something they have committed to address and like all Canadians we are waiting,” WestJet Airlines President Diederik Pen said in a statement Sunday. Since Thursday, WestJet has cancelled 829 flights scheduled to fly between then and Monday — the busiest travel weekend of the season. The vast majority of Sunday’s trips were called off as WestJet pared down its 180-plane fleet to 32 active aircraft and topped the global list for cancellations among major airlines over the weekend. Both WestJet and the Airplane Mechanics Fraternal Association have accused the other side of refusing to negotiate in good faith. The union’s goal remains a deal hammered out through bargaining rather than by an arbitrator — a route it opposed from the start. The union says its demands around wages would cost WestJet less than $8m Canadian (US$5.6m) beyond what the company has offered for the first year of the collective agreement — the first contract between the two sides. It has acknowledged the gains would surpass compensation for industry colleagues across Canada and sit more on par with US counterparts.<br/>