Noha Zaher and Ibraheem Sabry say they’ve endured nearly 60 hours of travel chaos and confusion in an effort to return to Ottawa after their vacation abroad.
The couple and their two kids spent Tuesday at Toronto’s Pearson airport after they were denied boarding twice in Cairo because their flights with two different airlines were overbooked as a result of Air Canada flight cancellations.
After finally making their way to Toronto, they’ve resolved to take a bus to Ottawa.
“We were, of course, frustrated,” said Zaher. “I had work on Monday, so I missed two days of work after three weeks of vacation.”
The family is among thousands of passengers still scrambling to reach their destinations as Air Canada’s flights gradually began resuming in the aftermath of a three-day strike by its flight attendants.
News of the tentative deal between Air Canada and the Canadian Union of Public Employees came early Tuesday morning, and the airline said it planned to operate more than half of its scheduled flights by the end of the day.
The airline has cautioned that a return to full, regular service would take seven to 10 days as aircraft and crew are out of position. Some flights will continue to be cancelled until the schedule is stabilized, Air Canada said, and only customers with confirmed bookings whose flights are shown as operating should go to the airport.
For Maxime Vidal, the resumed flights can’t come soon enough. He said he and his family were supposed to fly to Paris from Toronto, but the flight was cancelled and they’ve heard no word yet from the airline on when they’ll be rebooked.
“We have a life in France and we have to go back to work,” he said. “It’s going to be complicated a little bit if we don’t have a flight for tomorrow.”
Steve Marcotte said he was on vacation in Ontario for a week with his wife and granddaughter and they were set to return home to Newfoundland before their flight was cancelled.
They decided to book last-minute flights to Halifax instead to visit his son, then fly back to Newfoundland from there — a plan that will cost them thousands of dollars, he said.
“It’s very stressful,” Marcotte said. “I want to go home.”
The federal government intervened in the strike on Saturday morning, invoking Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code to force Air Canada and the union into binding arbitration. The Canada Industrial Relations Board ordered flight attendants to return to work Sunday.
Union officials defied that order, leading the board to state Monday that the strike was unlawful even as the union said it would press ahead.
The airline and the union met through the night with a federal mediator before reaching a tentative agreement. The deal will be brought to more than 10,000 members of the Air Canada component of CUPE for a vote.
The union said it must advise members to “fully co-operate with resumption of operations.”
Air Canada estimated Monday that some 500,000 customers’ flights had been cancelled since the strike began.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 19, 2025.
