During peak fishing season, it can be hard to get off the island if you didn’t book months in advance.  Last week, it was impossible. On the heels of a month of flight delays and cancellations, Alaska Airlines temporarily suspended the program that guarantees locals a seat on flights in and out of Unalaska.  Now it’s back.

No one likes the feeling of being trapped, which is how the community access program came about.

In peak seasons the seafood industry buys every available seat on Alaska Airlines flights to and from Unalaska, leaving locals with last-minute travel needs stranded on the island.

So about four years ago Mayor Shirley Marquardt approached Alaska Airlines with a request.  She wanted them to create a program that would allow locals to get a seat, even when the flights were full.  And Alaska agreed.

“And at that point he said, ‘What we’re going to do is basically overbook the flight by up to four seats.  And if we have to bump some bags or some weight, we’ll do that.  But we’ll confirm seats.”

In recent weeks though, this plan went out the window.  I called Customer Service at the Fish Desk to find out what was up. 

“Thank you for holding Stephanie.  We did have a bulletin about that.  It’s only from the 14th of October through the 25th of December.  We won’t have the ability to overbook for local access.  But the flights are still going to be there.  They may be very full."

Which in fact, they were.  As of this morning (October 31), there were no seats available leaving Unalaska until November 19.

So why did community access program get the ax? Alaska Airlines Marketing Director Scott Habberstad says it used to be that Alaska Air and PenAir shared a so-called combi flight that stopped in Cold Bay on the way to Anchorage.  When locals needed seats, they would buy into PenAir’s Cold Bay seats.  But with recent high demand for Unalaska flights, they eliminated the combi and made it a direct flight to Anchorage.

“And in doing that, that was our outlet for the local access program.”

But the extra seats created by the direct flight weren’t specifically reserved for locals.

“So we had to recreate the local access program.  Which doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it took us a few days to make it happen.”

I asked Habberstad to clarify why the program didn’t automatically carry over.

“The need wasn’t really there.  Or it hadn’t been brought to our attention.  As soon as it was brought to our attention we implemented it.”

On Friday afternoon Alaska Airlines revealed their new local access program, which looks a lot like the old one, with a few minor changes. 

“What we’ve done is [add] just one seat on each of the core flights.  That way if you need an early flight you have access to it.  If you need a late flight you have access to it.”

The desk is up and running again and Unalaskans should be able to get off the island, when they need to. 

Click here for full program details.