Travelers across Canada are facing another day of severe disruption as Air Canada grapples with a fresh wave of operational issues, leading to 28 flight cancellations and 206 delays on Saturday, February 7, 2026. From Toronto’s Pearson International Airport to Ottawa, Quebec City, Montreal and Victoria, thousands of passengers have been left stranded or significantly delayed, with knock-on effects rippling through domestic and transborder routes. The latest disruption adds to a difficult winter season for Canadian aviation, where snowstorms, congested hubs and tight airline schedules have combined to create a fraught travel landscape.
Nationwide Disruption Concentrated at Major Hubs
The majority of today’s cancellations and delays are concentrated at Canada’s busiest airports, particularly Toronto Pearson, Montreal Trudeau and Vancouver, with secondary effects felt in Ottawa, Quebec City and Victoria. At Pearson, where Air Canada operates its primary hub, delays of one to three hours have become common on both domestic and international departures as aircraft, crews and airport services struggle to recover from a week of rolling schedule pressures.
Real-time status boards on Saturday morning and early afternoon showed multiple Air Canada flights departing Toronto for Winnipeg, St. John’s and other key cities leaving significantly behind schedule, while some overnight services were pushed into the early hours of Saturday after missing their Friday departure slots. Similar patterns of creeping delays are visible at Montreal and Vancouver, where Air Canada’s feeder and long-haul services are competing for limited gate space and de-icing resources at peak periods.
While the headline figure of 28 outright cancellations may appear modest against the airline’s total daily schedule, the 206 delays carry an outsized impact for passengers. Many of those delayed flights are core trunk routes that connect smaller Canadian communities to major hubs, meaning a single delayed departure from Toronto or Montreal can cascade into missed connections and overnight stranding in multiple cities.
Toronto: The Epicenter of a Fragile Network
Toronto Pearson once again sits at the center of Canada’s air travel turmoil. As Air Canada’s largest hub, the airport functions as the beating heart of the carrier’s network, with aircraft continuously shuttling between domestic, transborder and international destinations. When operations in Toronto slow, the impact is immediate and national in scope. On Friday evening into the early hours of Saturday, several key flights from Pearson, including services to Winnipeg and Atlantic Canada, departed hours late, compressing rest periods for crews and tightening turnaround windows for aircraft.
Saturday’s mid-day bank of departures from Toronto has seen a growing cluster of delayed flights. Long-haul services, such as Air Canada’s Toronto to Seoul route, are being closely watched by anxious travelers, many of whom have already endured extended waits due to earlier disruptions. Even when long-haul flights manage to push back close to schedule, late-arriving feeder flights from cities like Ottawa, Quebec City or Victoria mean that some connecting passengers are missing their onward legs, forcing rebookings onto already crowded alternatives.
This fragility is compounded by the cumulative effects of earlier storms and operational constraints. Flight crews must observe strict duty-time regulations, and aircraft require structured maintenance windows. When bad weather or congestion earlier in the week forces mass cancellations or long delays, airlines often spend days rebuilding their schedules, shuffling aircraft and crews across the network. For travelers, that means that the disruption they feel on February 7 may be the delayed consequence of a snowstorm or system meltdown several days earlier.
Ottawa, Quebec City and Montreal Feel the Knock-On Effects
While Toronto bears the brunt of the disruption, travelers in Ottawa, Quebec City and Montreal are also facing an unpredictable day. Many of Air Canada’s short-haul routes in this corridor rely on tight turnaround times, with the same aircraft and crews operating multiple legs between the three cities and beyond. When a morning departure from Toronto leaves late, the downstream flights from Ottawa to Quebec City or Montreal often depart behind schedule as well, compounding delays as the day progresses.
In Ottawa, passengers booked on Air Canada services to Toronto and Montreal have reported departure boards that fluctuate between “on time,” “delayed,” and “awaiting aircraft” as the airline works to reposition planes and absorb rolling delays. For travelers heading onward to international destinations, even a modest delay on an Ottawa to Toronto flight can mean missing a once-daily departure to Europe or Asia, triggering costly last-minute hotel stays and complex rebooking arrangements.
In Quebec City, the impact is most visible on routes that connect via Montreal and Toronto. Here, local passengers are discovering that a delay or cancellation in a distant hub can abruptly transform a simple one-stop itinerary into a multi-leg odyssey, sometimes involving re-routes through alternate airports. Montreal itself, as a secondary hub for Air Canada, is juggling congestion from both originating traffic and connecting passengers trying to thread their way through a disrupted network.
Victoria and Western Canada Confront a New Round of Uncertainty
Far from the central Canadian hubs, Victoria and other western cities are encountering their own share of frustration. At Victoria International Airport, Air Canada’s schedule on Saturday morning showed several flights operating on time, but recent days have illustrated just how quickly conditions can change. Delays in Vancouver or Calgary, particularly on Air Canada and its regional partners, can quickly cascade to the island, where flight frequencies are lower and alternative options limited.
For travelers in Victoria, a delayed feeder flight to Vancouver or Calgary can mean missing connections to Toronto, Ottawa or Montreal, with few same-day alternatives available. Many passengers in smaller markets rely heavily on a single early-morning departure to make onward connections, and any disruption to that lifeline can force a full-day delay. When combined with broader network strain and regional weather challenges, the result is a travel environment in which even seemingly minor schedule changes can upend carefully planned itineraries.
Calgary and Edmonton, while not in the immediate spotlight of today’s 28 Air Canada cancellations and 206 delays, are also feeling the strain. Flights between the western hubs and Toronto or Montreal continue to experience schedule pressure as aircraft and crews arrive late from earlier legs. As a result, westbound travelers who thought they had left the worst of the disruption behind in Eastern Canada are sometimes discovering that their journeys are far from over.
Passenger Experiences: Missed Connections and Overnight Stays
For travelers, the statistics of cancellations and delays translate into deeply personal stories of missed milestones, unexpected costs and mounting frustration. Across Canadian airports on Saturday, lines have formed at check-in counters and customer service desks as passengers seek rebookings, meal vouchers and hotel accommodations. Many travelers report spending hours in terminal queues or on customer service phone lines simply trying to secure a seat on the next available flight.
Families bound for winter holidays or reunions are particularly hard hit when connecting flights are missed due to upstream delays. A family traveling from Victoria to a European destination via Toronto, for example, may find their initial transcontinental leg operating hours late, transforming what should have been a straightforward connection into an overnight wait or multi-city reroute. Business travelers, too, are feeling the pinch as critical meetings, conferences and site visits are postponed or cancelled outright due to unpredictable arrival times.
At many airports, exhausted passengers can be seen camped out in seating areas or curled up near power outlets as they wait for new departure times. Some have been offered hotel vouchers, while others have been advised that limited room availability, especially near major hubs, means they may need to make their own arrangements. Travelers with limited travel insurance or tight budgets are particularly vulnerable, often bearing the full cost of unplanned meals, taxis and overnight stays.
What Is Driving the Latest Wave of Disruptions?
Several factors appear to be converging to produce today’s figures of 28 cancellations and 206 delays for Air Canada. Seasonal weather remains a key driver. In early February, Canadian airports regularly contend with snow, freezing rain, strong crosswinds and low visibility. Each of these conditions can trigger mandatory de-icing procedures, altered runway configurations and slower ground handling, all of which reduce the effective capacity of airports and lengthen turnaround times.
Operationally, Air Canada, like many carriers, is navigating a tight margin between scheduled capacity and available resources. After years of volatile demand patterns and staffing challenges, airlines have been rebuilding their networks with a strong emphasis on efficiency. This often leaves less slack in the system. When a storm or mechanical issue sidelines an aircraft or reduces crew availability, it can be difficult to recover quickly without triggering knock-on disruptions across the network.
Infrastructure constraints also play a role. Major hubs such as Toronto Pearson and Montreal Trudeau operate close to their capacity during peak periods, particularly in the early morning and late afternoon banks of departures. At these times, even a short ground hold or runway slowdown can result in rapid accumulation of delays. As those delayed flights fan out across the country, smaller airports like Ottawa, Quebec City and Victoria inherit the consequences.
How Travelers Can Navigate Ongoing Uncertainty
For those yet to begin their journeys this weekend, preparation and flexibility are essential. Travelers departing from affected cities like Toronto, Ottawa, Quebec City, Montreal and Victoria are being urged by airport authorities and travel advisors to monitor their flight status closely from home before heading to the airport. Same-day schedule changes have become increasingly common, with departure times being moved forward or backward by an hour or more as airlines attempt to optimize their operations in real time.
Arriving at the airport earlier than usual can help cushion against long security and check-in queues, particularly at major hubs where many flights are departing in compressed windows. However, early arrival alone is not a cure-all. Passengers should ensure they have access to their airline’s mobile app or online portal, where rebooking options occasionally become available before they are announced gate-side. Keeping chargers, medications, basic toiletries and at least one change of clothes in carry-on luggage is strongly recommended in case a short delay stretches into an unplanned overnight.
Those with connections, especially international ones, may wish to consider longer layovers where feasible, either by adjusting future bookings or choosing flights with more buffer time. While a three-hour connection may have once felt excessive on a domestic-to-international routing, in today’s environment it can provide a crucial safety net when upstream flights from cities like Ottawa, Quebec City or Victoria leave late due to late-arriving aircraft from Toronto or Montreal.
Looking Ahead: A Winter of Volatility
As of Saturday afternoon, there is little indication that Canada’s air travel system will snap back to normal overnight. The backlog created by today’s 28 Air Canada cancellations and 206 delays will likely spill into Sunday, especially on routes that operate with limited daily frequency. Aircraft and crews repositioned to recover today’s schedule may not be optimally placed for tomorrow’s flights, creating fresh pockets of vulnerability if additional weather or operational snags emerge.
For travelers planning trips over the coming weeks, the pattern of sporadic but severe disruption is likely to remain a defining feature of this winter travel season. While airlines and airports continue to refine their contingency plans and invest in operational resilience, the combination of harsh weather, high demand and constrained capacity means that even well-planned itineraries can unravel with little warning.
Amid the uncertainty, one message is clear for anyone traveling within or through Canada: build flexibility into your plans, monitor conditions closely, and be prepared for a journey that may take longer and involve more unexpected turns than it looks on paper. From Toronto and Ottawa to Quebec City, Montreal and Victoria, today’s events are a reminder that in mid-winter Canada, every flight is part of a tightly interwoven system, where a disruption in one city can quickly be felt from coast to coast.