Alaska Seaplanes announced on Wednesday that it would shut down the Petersburg and Wrangell stations at the close in the month. Alaska Seaplanes is the only commuter airline that competes against Alaska Airlines in Southeast Alaska.
The General Manager Carl Ramseth says the decision was not taken lightly.
“It was a most difficult decision to make, and it was a result of a lot of deliberation, years and months of deliberation,” he said. “[Iconsider this to be probably the toughest decision I’ve had to make personally over the past 30+ years of aviation as well as Southeast. It was never our intention to go away.”
The closure will be in effect for passengers starting on October. 31. The same applies to cargo October. 28.
The airline provides twice-a-day connections connecting Petersburg and Juneau that allow residents to make day trips to the capital city. They will be ending, along with triangular flights that are scheduled to connect Sitka, Wrangell and Petersburg 3 times per week.
Alaska Seaplanes began serving Petersburg in April of 2021. They will also be serving Wrangell in the month of May 2022. Ramseth states that once Seaplanes begins serving a community, they will follow a three-year timeframe to give time to establish an established presence within the town. This is the second time Seaplanes has been forced out of an area before the three-year period has ended.
“With Wrangell and Petersburg, it’s the that the ridership and traffic did not grow as much as we’d like,” said Ramseth.
However, it’s not the only reason. Alaska Seaplanes also rely on transporting cargo. This brings more business in small towns like Tenakee Springs and Klawock because they’re not served through Alaska Airlines. Ramseth claims that this is not the case with regard to Wrangell as well as Petersburg.
“One issue the residents of Wrangell and Petersburg have in common with the majority of the other communities in our area has to do with the fact that we’re not able to transport any UPS or mail and don’t bring enough cargo to these towns,” he said. “So this affects our bottom line as well.”
Seaplanes employs two part-time workers in Wrangell. Petersburg has two full-time and two part-time employees. They were all informed about the closing this week. Ramseth states that even though there are positions within the company in other places, all employees would like to remain where they are.
The closure is not permanent but Ramseth declares he would love to return to Wrangell and Petersburg at some point in the future should things alter.
Alaska Seaplanes isn’t the first commuter airline to announce it quits following a brief period in the central Southeast. Island Air ended its Petersburg to Juneau flights after only nine months in the year 2018. Scott Van Valin, co-owner and director of operations said to KFSK on the day of its announcement that there wasn’t enough demand from passengers for the flights.
