Itzhak Perlman was stuck in the Twilight Zone.

That’s the term the celebrated Israeli-American violinist uses to describe the area between his arrival gate and passport control at Toronto Pearson International Airport, where an Air Canada employee left the disabled musician stranded on Monday.

Perlman was in town for a charity concert. Having contracted polio as a child, he requires a scooter or crutches to get around, and is on Air Canada’s list of passengers needing assistance to get to the airport exit.

But on Monday, the employee assigned to assist him would only go so far.

The pair made it down one elevator and the employee helped load Perlman’s carry-on baggage onto a second elevator, but refused to accompany him.

“He said something like: ‘I’m leaving you here. I have other flights,’” Perlman, now back in New York, told the Star on Tuesday.

Feeling abandoned, Perlman gritted his teeth going down that second elevator alone, with his crutches, two small bags around his scooter and a bigger bag on his lap, as well as his precious violin.

Before the elevator doors shut, Perlman recalls asking: “What am I going to do?” to which he says the attendant replied along the lines of: “It’s your problem, you’re the one who chose to carry an extra bag …You’re not paying me, are you?”

Have you experienced anything like this at Pearson airport? Share your thoughts in the comments below

He said he was left in the Twilight Zone because, while he did have someone waiting for him at the exit, that person was not able to come in through passport control to fetch him. That’s why being accompanied by an airline official was crucial.

Perlman said he finally got some help from a police officer and made it to his final destination. An ironic situation, given the employee’s first words to Perlman when he disembarked from the airplane: “I’m here to help you.”

He had felt at first that the employee would be sympathetic to his situation, as he told Perlman that his own father was in a wheelchair as the result of a car accident.

“And then he just leaves me,” said Perlman.

Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick said the airline found Perlman’s story “very concerning,” and would be investigating, as well as apologizing to Perlman.

Perlman’s experience “is not at all representative of Air Canada’s policies to take care of customers with disabilities,” wrote Fitzpatrick in an email.

The violin virtuoso, who has performed for the Queen and at Barack Obama’s inauguration, travels constantly — with concerts planned in April alone in Chicago, Baltimore, Azerbaijan and Turkey — and customarily gets assistance from airline or airport employees because of his disability.

He was in Toronto to perform at a charity concert at Roy Thomson Hall in support of Chai Lifeline Canada, which helps children suffering from serious illnesses.

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Perlman said he has travelled to Canada numerous times over the past 40 years and had never experienced such an encounter with an airline employee before.

“As I was going through the airport on my scooter alone, I was looking around and I kept seeing these signs that said, ‘Welcome to Canada.’ And I just thought, ‘Oy.’”

With files from Laura Kane

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