Canadian air traffic controllers are showing their support of their American counterparts by buying them hundreds of pizzas as the U.S. government’s partial shutdown continues.
Peter Duffey, the head of the Canadian Air Traffic Control Association said it all started when employees at Edmonton’s control center had the idea to buy the pizza for controllers in Anchorage, Alaska on Thursday. And as word got out, many other facilities across Canada decided to join in on the act of solidarity.
“The next thing we knew, our members were buying pizzas left, right and center for the colleagues in the U.S,” Duffey said to the Associated Press. “As it stands right now, I believe we’re up to 36 facilities that have received pizza from Canada, and that number is growing by the hour.”
Duffey believes that by Sunday afternoon, an estimated 300 pizzas had been sent by union members who were looking for a way to support their American colleagues, who then took to social media to thank them.
“Air traffic control is a very stressful job,” Duffey said to the AP. “They say you have to be 100 percent right, 100 percent of the time. People just don’t need to be reporting to work with the added stress of worrying about how to pay their mortgages and grocery bills on top of it.”