Ottawa, Jun 19 (AP) Canadian airline WestJet has begun cancelling some flights in anticipation of a strike by aircraft maintenance technicians, saying it wants to avoid having passengers and planes stranded if there is a walkout.

WestJet said it expected to cancel about 40 flights from Tuesday through Wednesday, affecting 6,500 passengers. By Wednesday afternoon Eastern time, the airline had cancelled 20 flights, or 4 per cent of its schedule, after cancelling five flights Tuesday, according to tracking service FlightAware.

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The low-fare airline said it was trying to find alternate arrangements for customers whose flights were dropped.

WestJet and the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association are locked in negotiations for an initial collective-bargaining agreement covering about 680 mechanics.

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Earlier this week, WestJet asked the Canadian Industrial Relations Board to order both sides into binding arbitration. The union responded by notifying the airline of its intention to strike as soon as Thursday night unless the company returned to the bargaining table this week in Calgary.

Diederik Pen, the airline's president, said the company's most recent contract offer would have made WestJet maintenance engineers the highest paid in Canada and raise their take-home pay 30 to 40 per cent within a year.

The union says the airline is trying to impose a contract that its members rejected by a 97.5 per cent vote, and that low pay is preventing WestJet from filling open jobs.

WestJet was founded in the 1990s and modelled after Southwest Airlines in the US It is Canada's second-largest airline. (AP)

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)