After nearly four days of unprecedented disruption, Air Canada is preparing to take to the skies once again. On August 19, 2025, the airline announced it would gradually resume operations following a hard-fought agreement with the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), representing more than 10,000 flight attendants. The strike, which marked the first walkout by Air Canada’s cabin crew in four decades, brought the country’s largest airline to a standstill and left hundreds of thousands of travelers stranded or scrambling for alternatives.
"The strike has ended. We have a tentative agreement we will bring forward to you," CUPE declared in a Facebook post early Tuesday, as reported by Reuters. The union instructed its membership to "fully cooperate with resumption of operations," signaling a new, if cautious, chapter in the contentious relationship between Air Canada and its flight crews.
For Air Canada’s leadership, the relief was palpable. "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," said Michael Rousseau, Air Canada’s President and CEO, in a statement published Tuesday and cited by NBC News and Reuters. Rousseau also warned that restarting operations would be a "complex undertaking," with full restoration of regular service potentially taking seven to ten days as aircraft and crews are repositioned. The first flights were scheduled for the evening of August 19, but the airline cautioned that some cancellations would persist until schedules stabilized.
The strike began in the early hours of Saturday, August 16, 2025, after contract talks between CUPE and Air Canada failed to yield a satisfactory agreement. At the heart of the dispute were issues of pay and working conditions—specifically, compensation for time spent on the ground, such as boarding passengers. Flight attendants argued that these tasks, though essential, had long gone unpaid. The union’s push for "ground pay" mirrored recent advances won by counterparts at major U.S. carriers, including American Airlines.
"Unpaid work is over. We have reclaimed our voice and our power. When our rights were taken away, we stood strong, we fought back—and we secured a tentative agreement that our members can vote on," CUPE stated Tuesday, as reported by CBC and Reuters. Details of the agreement have not been publicly disclosed, but Air Canada’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operations Officer, Mark Nasr, confirmed to CBC that "ground pay is settled. Our flight attendants will be compensated for their time on the ground."
The strike’s impact was immediate and severe. Air Canada, which serves about 130,000 passengers daily, estimated that roughly 500,000 customers had their flights canceled, according to NBC News. Thousands of flights were scrapped, and the airline was forced to withdraw its third-quarter and full-year earnings guidance, reflecting the deep operational and financial wounds inflicted by the labor stoppage.
For travelers, the experience was a mix of empathy and exasperation. Some, like retiree Klaus Hickman, expressed support for the flight attendants’ demands but worried about their own disrupted plans. "They want to get more money to survive. And so it is with everybody else," Hickman told Reuters. Others, such as James Numfor of Regina, Saskatchewan, faced more dire circumstances. After returning from his brother’s funeral in Cameroon, Numfor and his family were left stranded in Toronto for two nights, receiving only one night of hotel accommodation from Air Canada before being left to sleep in the airport.
Behind the scenes, the labor dispute escalated into a three-way standoff involving the airline, the union, and the Canadian government. On Sunday, August 17, the Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) declared the strike unlawful and ordered all Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge flight attendants to return to work by 2 p.m. ET. The directive followed Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu’s decision to impose binding arbitration and extend the existing contract while negotiations continued. CUPE, however, initially refused to comply, calling the government’s order "blatantly unconstitutional" and "a disgraceful misuse of power that reeks of systemic bias and corporate favoritism," as union secretary and treasurer Candace Rennick stated.
Minister Hajdu, for her part, promised a thorough investigation into allegations of unpaid work in the airline sector, pledging that a government probe would take six to eight weeks and be made public. The move was seen as a response to mounting pressure from unions across the aviation, construction, and rail sectors, all of which have sought better pay and working conditions amid a tight labor market.
Amid the chaos, Air Canada’s customer service teams worked overtime. Mark Nasr told CBC that 5,000 employees were engaged in rebooking affected passengers on Air Canada and more than 120 other airlines. Customers with canceled flights were offered a choice between a refund, travel credit, or rebooking on another carrier. The airline urged travelers to check the status of their flights via its website or mobile app, and reminded only those with confirmed bookings for operating flights to proceed to the airport.
The strike also brought to the surface longstanding gender disparities in airline compensation. According to CUPE, pilots—a role predominantly filled by men—received a 26% pay increase in 2024, while the mostly female flight attendants were offered only an 8% raise in 2025. This gap became a rallying point for the union, which argued that its members’ contributions had been undervalued for too long.
As the dust settles, the outcome of this labor battle may resonate far beyond Air Canada. The union’s success in securing ground pay could set a precedent for other airline workers in Canada and elsewhere, particularly as labor activism continues to surge in sectors battered by the pandemic and labor shortages. The government’s promised investigation into unpaid work may also shape future labor policy for the country’s aviation industry.
For now, weary passengers and flight crews alike are looking forward to a return to normalcy—though, as Air Canada’s leadership cautions, that may still be a week or more away. The airline’s gradual restart, coupled with lingering cancellations and logistical hurdles, means the effects of the strike will be felt for days to come. But for flight attendants, the tentative agreement represents a hard-won milestone in their decades-long fight for fair compensation and respect on the job.
With flights resuming and a new contract on the horizon, both Air Canada and its employees are hoping for smoother skies ahead—even if the turbulence of recent days won’t soon be forgotten.
