At the end of the day, at what point should an airline or hotel or manufacturer give something away for free though? Yes it's a sad day for Canadians but the optics of WS saying hey look we'll fly everyone for free seems like a PR move. Even when AC flew RCMP officers back and forth for free, I was sitting there going...well that's an interesting stunt...even if it is good hearted in nature, it costs a company and what does this say about ROI? It'd be high ROI to do something "good nature" and then tell the world, so is it really "charity" or a stunt?
If I were AC, I would have flown the family for free. Tell the world how awesome I was. Alas they didn't, hence now, this.
It'd be cheaper for AC/WS to do something nice than to do a PR move...