Trash Truck Drivers Stage 5-Hour Strike : Labor: The work stoppage, to protest the dismissal of three co-workers at Waste Management Inc., delays pickups in five South County cities.

More than 100 South County trash truck drivers walked off their jobs without warning Thursday morning to protest the firing of three co-workers, then just as suddenly returned to work five hours later and opened talks with their bosses.

The short-lived wildcat strike delayed garbage pickups in five cities--Irvine, Laguna Hills, Lake Forest, Laguna Beach and Mission Viejo--as well as some unincorporated parts of the county. All are served by Waste Management Inc. of Orange County through government contracts.

Trash pickups resumed in late morning, but officials said some homes and businesses would have to wait until today to get their trash removed from curbs. Government officials and representatives of the trash-hauling giant were uncertain how many people were affected by the strike.

The drivers are not organized in a labor union but said they decided to stage the protest because many were angry over the firings earlier this week of three workers whom management accused of “taking unauthorized breaks on company time.” The company refused to release the workers’ names.

“Basically, (the fired workers) were on company time and had their trucks stopped for several hours, talking and--in our opinion--cheating the company and cheating the residents they served,” said Michele Blair, a spokeswoman for the Santa Ana-based company.

But several drivers--who demanded anonymity because of concern about their job security--insisted that the firings were unwarranted and came during a time of increasingly burdensome regulations imposed by Waste Management on its employees.

“This whole thing began about eight to 10 months ago,” said one driver. “We got some new administrators, and right away they told us we had to make more stops, pick up more trash and, at the same time, keep a clean safety record, which meant no accidents.”

“All this for the same salary,” he added.

Drivers have also complained that Waste Management has threatened harsher discipline for relatively small infractions and has cut back vacation time.

When a group of senior drivers tried to talk to their managers about such issues recently, they were refused an audience, several said.

Drivers said Thursday’s strike was an unplanned outburst of frustration. A job action was discussed during the week, drivers said, but they never agreed on any formal plans for a protest.

Instead, the drivers showed up for work Thursday and decided en masse to participate in the walkout, they said, adding that there were no protest leaders. For the most part, they stayed in the vicinity of the company’s Irvine yard, demonstrating peacefully, according to witnesses.

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Irvine City Manager Paul O. Brady Jr. said that police monitored the informal picketing at the Construction Circle site to guard against trouble, but there was none.

“It’s been very quiet out on the site. There’s been no violence, and things have been very peaceful,” Brady said.

But the quiet meant difficulties for people hoping to get rid of a week’s trash.

Trash pickups ordinarily begin before 6 a.m., but company spokeswoman Blair said that all of the 100 or so drivers on Thursday’s 94 local routes clocked in and almost immediately clocked out.

“They just decided to walk out,” she said. “But just walking out on the job, we don’t feel that’s any way to deal with a situation like this, or not the best way.”

Waste Management responded by bringing in drivers from its Inland Empire plants, although officials acknowledged that they faced significant delays because this week’s Northridge earthquake had already strained the company’s staffing and resources.

Five hours into the work stoppage, Waste Management officials agreed to sit down with representatives for the drivers to discuss their grievances.

The drivers in turn agreed to return to work around 11 a.m. Talks were expected to continue into the night.

“They’re all trying to see if we can work this out,” Blair said.

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Cymantha Atkinson, a spokeswoman for the county’s Integrated Waste Management Department, which contracts with Waste Management to haul trash in some unincorporated parts of South County, said the company had asked for extended hours today to dump its trash at the county’s Frank R. Bowerman Landfill in Irvine because of Thursday’s problems.

But the county wants to wait to see if extended hours are necessary, Atkinson said.

Blair said Waste Management was hoping to cover half its regular routes on Thursday, coming back for the rest today or over the weekend.

She could not say how many homes and businesses might have to leave their garbage on the curb for an extra day or two.

“I can’t even give you a rough estimate,” she said.

Waste Management, which employs 67,000 people nationwide and describes itself as the largest environmental services company in the world, has contracts through its local offices to provide trash hauling for seven Orange County municipalities and parts of the county itself.

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Times staff writer Kevin Johnson contributed to this report.