Air Canada flights to and from Bermuda resumed as normal yesterday after days of travel disruption caused by a strike of flight attendants throughout the company.

The airline had confirmed this week that all of its flights had been cancelled “until further notice”, resulting in hundreds of planes being grounded.

Skyport said that all Bermuda flights went ahead yesterday and that there were no scheduled flights on Thursdays.

However, Air Canada has said it would “gradually restart its operations”.

The strike was called by Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents about 10,000 flight attendants, over contract negotiations.

The union claimed the flight attendants were being underpaid in light of inflation increases over the years and were not being adequately compensated when off the planes.

CUPE said in a statement on its website: “Flight attendants at Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge have reached a tentative agreement, achieving transformational change for our industry after an historic fight to affirm our charter rights.

“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.”

Michael Rousseau, the president and chief executive of Air Canada, said in a statement on the carrier’s website that it had reached a mediated agreement with the CUPE through a process overseen by William Kaplan, a mutually agreed mediator.

“Mediation discussions were begun on the basis that the union commit to have the airline’s 10,000 flight attendants immediately return to work, allowing the airline to resume the operations of Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge, which have been grounded since August 16,” Mr Rousseau said.

“The suspension of our service is extremely difficult for our customers. We deeply regret and apologise for the impact on them of this labour disruption.

“Our priority now is to get them moving as quickly as possible. Restarting a major carrier like Air Canada is a complex undertaking.

“Full restoration may require a week or more, so we ask for our customers’ patience and understanding over the coming days. I assure them that everyone at Air Canada is doing everything possible to enable them to travel soon.”

The airline said that a return to a regular service may require seven to ten days because aircraft and crew are out of position.

It added: “During this process, some flights will be cancelled over the next seven to ten days until the schedule is stabilised”.

This week, The Royal Gazette spoke with passengers using the airline for travel between Canada and Bermuda whose travel plans were disrupted as a result of the strike.