In 2004, Air Canada employees made concessions of over $2 Billion. At the same time ACE assured employees that the sale of Aeroplan, Jazz and Air Canada Technical Services was undertaken for the purpose of re-investing in Air Canada.

Instead ACE has sold the most profitable arms of Air Canada and distributed over $2 Billion to a group of largely foreign shareholders. This windup is merely the final chapter in a sad tale of broken promises.

Air Canada Pilots are proud of Air Canada. We strongly believe that it is a vital part of the economic and social fabric of Canada. We remain fully committed to our goal of serving the traveling public of Canada with safety and integrity, as we have throughout our 71-year history.

ACPA is the largest professional pilot group in Canada, representing the 3,300 pilots who operate Air Canada’s mainline fleet.

The 28 January 2008 incident is described as “serious” in a Irish Air Accident Investigation Unit synoptic report.

It says the captain’s awareness that all was not well began pre-flight when the co-pilot, who had positioned into Toronto Pearson Airport from Montreal as a passenger, arrived with little time to spare and seemed “quite harried”.

The captain told the co-pilot to meet him at the aircraft, assuring him that all flight preparations were complete. After the flight left on time and climbed to flight level 360 the captain became increasingly worried about the co-pilot’s condition and behaviour, which was out-of-character.

More than once the co-pilot re-entered the cockpit using non-standard security procedures, and eventually began to speak in an unco-ordinated way, eventually becoming “belligerent and unco-operative”, and failing to fasten his harness on returning to his seat.

The captain called for the assistance of the cabin crew to remove the pilot from his seat, identified two doctors on board who attended to him and, in the absence of any pilots among the passengers, enlisted the help of the CPL-qualified flight attendant.

Once in VHF radio contact with Shanwick Oceanic, the captain made a ‘pan’ call and requested diversion to Shannon, where the weather was good compared with the aircraft’s destination, London Heathrow. The aircraft landed safely.

Medical staff met the co-pilot who was hospitallised for 11 days before being returned to Canada on a medevac flight, where his treatment continued.

The AAIU report does not describe the medical diagnosis, but lists Transport Canada advice about pilot subtle incapacitation for which, it says, the most common causes include hypoxia, hypoglycaemia, extreme fatigue, alcohol or toxic substances, and which can involve neurological causes like stroke or a brain tumour.

Irish investigators have not made any recommendations.

Air Canada officials said that 300 flight attendant positions will be eliminated from Vancouver, due to a decrease in international long-haul flights from that base. In addition, Air Canada will close its flight attendant bases at Winnipeg and Halifax as of November 1. As a result, 145 flight attendant jobs in Winnipeg, and 187 in Halifax will be lost. According to news reports, Air Canada may offer some flight attendants who are losing their jobs at those bases an opportunity to transfer to Toronto or Montreal.

Air Canada flight attendants are represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE). An article about the Air Canada layoffs on the CBC News website quotes Lisa Vivian Anthony, president of CUPE Local 4090 in Halifax, who said, “We are shocked and we are in a state of disbelief. Our base has been in operation in Halifax for 32 years, so this is essentially the end of an era for us.”