Anchorage Daily News

SEATTLE -- Travel prospects improved Tuesday for Alaskans, as snowbound Seattle got a break in the weather and flights in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska were taking off as planned.

Still, Alaska Airlines spokesman Paul McElroy said the airline couldn't promise to make up all the backlog by Christmas Day.

Back-to-back snowstorms stranded thousands at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, the jumping-off point for most travel to Alaska and a vital airfreight hub to the Last Frontier.

The heavy snow that fell on the Seattle area beginning Thursday forced Seattle-based Alaska Airlines, the major carrier to its namesake state, to cancel some 450 flights in and out of Seattle through Monday, affecting tens of thousands of people, McElroy said. Other carriers serving Sea-Tac likewise were forced to cancel or delay flights.

"This is a historic storm. That's the fallout," McElroy said.

Despite the better weather Tuesday, "we know that there are some customers we will not be able to get to their destination by Christmas, and we certainly regret that," he said.

Holiday flights were already nearly full, so rebooking thousands of stranded travelers -- both going to Alaska and leaving for warmer climates -- was going slowly. McElroy said standby passengers were filling planes to capacity, and the airline had called in extra staff to try to soothe passengers as they waited.

Sea-Tac officials estimated up to 4,000 people spent Sunday night in the terminal, sleeping on chairs or the floor, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported. Alaska Airlines' problems were compounded when it ran low on aircraft deicing fluid after two trucks couldn't get over the Cascade Range and a rail shipment was stuck when railroad switches froze, McElroy told the newspaper.

Chad Ricci, 45, of Dutch Harbor was trying not to get his hopes up Tuesday after four days stuck in airports up and down the West Coast. On Friday, he was lying on a beach in Cancun, Mexico. Since then, he's slept at airports in San Diego, Sacramento and Seattle.

Ricci said he still has a week to get back to his job as a crane operator at a fish processing plant.

"Hopefully I can get from Seattle to Anchorage today," said Ricci, who was on standby for every Alaska Airlines flight from Seattle to Anchorage on Tuesday. He hoped to get on a plane from Anchorage to Dutch Harbor on Wednesday.

"Once I get to Anchorage, I'm comfortable," he said.

Seattle's backup reverberated at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, where a line of 80 people tried to find a flight out Monday. Among them were Kirk and Sandy Pintus, whose flight home to St. George, Utah. had been canceled. They told the Anchorage Daily News that they had spent hours trying to reach someone at Alaska Airlines by phone, then finally decided to go to the ticket counter.

"I bet we've racked up probably four hours on each of our cells," Kirk Pintus said.

"It's insane," his wife added.

Fairbanks Mayor Terry Strle sympathized with the passengers, saying by telephone from her office that she's been stuck in Seattle before and knows how frustrating it can be.

"For those who are stranded, remember your tough Alaskan spirit," she said.

Fairbanks was expecting highs of 25 degrees below zero this weekend, so stranded passengers might even enjoy the relative warmth of Seattle, where temperatures were in the 30s Tuesday.

Christmas presents were moving out of Seattle faster than holiday visitors this week, airlines and freight carriers said. Spokesmen for FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service said weather had not seriously affected shipments to Alaska, because cargo flights can be easily rerouted to avoid snowed-in cities.

Alaska Airline's McElroy said the airline did experience some freight delays in both Seattle and Portland, Ore., through the weekend but expected to catch up by Wednesday.

ADVERTISEMENT