WINNIPEG — The Aveos aircraft maintenance facility in Winnipeg has shut its doors, throwing a whopping 350 people out of work.

Sunday afternoon, staff at the Saskatchewan Avenue shop were told by management the facility was closing immediately. Union leaders say similar closures are underway across the country, including Vancouver. That amounts to job losses totalling 3,000 people.

Aveos is the private firm created in 2007 when Air Canada converted its technical services division, which did all of the maintenance and repair work on its planes, into a stand-alone operation. In Winnipeg, Sunday’s closure is the culmination of several rounds of layoffs, weeklong furloughs and suspicions about the company’s finances. Air Canada makes up about 90 per cent of Aveos’ customer base, but the union says Air Canada has been sending maintenance work that’s exclusive to Aveos to other companies recently.

“A couple weeks ago, we started to get some real bad feelings from the company financially,” said Lorne Hammerberg, president of Local 714 of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. “I think everyone is in shock and disbelief.”

The closure affects everyone from highly-skilled, licensed aircraft technicians who make $35 per hour to data entry clerks.

maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.ca

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/Aveos-closure-costs-350-people-t-heir-jobs-143262716.html