Five workers at the Vale project in Long Harbour have been fired for leading a wildcat strike in July, but a union group is fighting to get their jobs back.

CBC has learned that four operating engineers and an electrician were let go following the work stoppage.

The workers were among hundreds of tradespeople building the $3.6-billion plant in Long Harbour, which will process nickel concentrate extracted from the Voisey’s Bay mine in Labrador.

In video recordings of the wildcat strike, crowds of workers can be seen standing around the picket line, ignoring a court-ordered injunction to go back to work.

The video may have cost the five workers their jobs.

In a letter of dismissal from the Long Harbour Employers Council, the workers were told that the contractor identified them as instigators of the strike following a review of video taken at the picket line.

The Resource Development Council, which represents unions at Long Harbour, has filed a grievance on behalf of the five workers.

The employees had walked out because they were unsatisfied with wages and how the company was interpreting the collective agreement on issues such as travel and living allowances.

They'll know within weeks if the fight will go all the way to arbitration.