Air Canada began canceling flights Thursday ahead of a possible strike by its flight attendants that could impact hundreds of thousands of travelers.

A complete shutdown of the country's largest airline threatens to impact about 130,000 people a day.

The airline said in a social media post that nearly 300 flight attendants, "twice as much as usual," did not report to work Thursday night.

"This will result in additional cancellations," the airline said. "We regret the inconvenience to customers."

Mark Nasr, chief operations officer for Air Canada, said the airline has begun a gradual suspension of Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge operations.

"All flights will be paused by Saturday early morning," he said.

Nasr said this approach will help facilitate an orderly restart, "which under

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