ST. JOHN’S, Newfoundland — Despite a fierce blizzard that shut down major highways, halted air travel and closed schools, snowplow operators were among 19,000 public workers on strike Wednesday in Canada’s eastern province of Newfoundland.
Snow, freezing rain and winds gusting to 62 mph have pelted the province since Sunday. Premier Roger Grimes has said he was prepared to declare a state of emergency following the death of an elderly woman who apparently could not reach the hospital from her home on the isolated Burin Peninsula because of snow-choked roads.
Declaring a state of emergency would give the province authority to order the striking plow operators back to work, the premier said.
The family of 81-year-old Cathleen Lucy Murphy has said nothing could be done to save her. The woman was badly injured in a fall Tuesday, said Bill Lockyer, mayor of Lawn, on Newfoundland’s south coast.
Tom Hanlon, president of the Newfoundland Association of Public Employees, said Wednesday that the death was a tragedy, but said it would not halt the strike, which began Sunday.
The union has agreed to free 61 snowplow operators from picket duty to clear the roads. Normally 200 plows would do the job.
In what is said to be the largest labor dispute in the province’s history, two public-sector unions are demanding higher wages and better pensions. The union has demanded a 15 percent pay raise over three years. The province has offered 13 percent, plus pension improvements.
