Air Canada workers strike

At least 90 Air Canada flights from Toronto and Montreal were canceled or delayed Friday because of a strike by ground personnel, officials said. About 150 Air Canada ground crew workers walked off the job Thursday night followed by baggage handlers Friday morning, prompting cancellations and delays at Toronto's Pearson International Airport and Pierre Elliott Trudeau in Montreal, Postmedia News reported. "There's been an illegal job action by a small number of our ground handling employees at Pearson," said Isabelle Arthur, a spokeswoman for Air Canada. "However, the vast majority of our employees continue to do their work and take care of our customers." Peel Regional Police in Ontario got a call about the strike around 10 p.m. and arrived at the Toronto airport to find about 150 workers gathered at Terminal 1, Constable Fiona Thivierge said. The strikers were "mostly milling about," she said, adding that people were already dispersing when police arrived. "They're yelling and chanting and stuff, but there are no signs and they're not disrupting the flow, which is what we were most concerned with," Thivierge said. The walkout was in response to a bill that passed the House of Commons March 13, preventing the airline from locking out pilots and blocking any legal strikes by members of the machinists union. The legislation, which passed the Senate two days later, affects about 8,600 ground crew and about 3,000 pilots.