Tourism

The cruise industry says Alaska can expect about 1.5 million ship passengers to visit this season. But with the first cruise ship of the season expected to arrive in Skagway on April 26, questions remain about the vaccination rates of visitors and the extra hurdles required to enter Canada.

Brian Salerno is Cruise Lines International Association’s senior vice president for maritime policy. On Wednesday, Mike Swasey talked with Salerno to get an industry perspective on what Alaskan’s should expect from the coming season.

Listen here:

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Mike Swasey: Brian, thanks so much for being here. I’m just going to ask you this straight out — how many people are coming to Skagway this summer?

Brian Salerno: You know, I don’t have it broken down. But overall, for Alaska, we’re estimating about 1.5 million passengers, that’s on 600 voyages by 40 individual ships. So the season will probably start out a little bit slower and will gradually build, but that’s the guess-timate right now.

Mike Swasey: And how does that compare to, let’s say, 2018 to 2019?

Brian Salerno: Well, I think it’s roughly comparable, to you know, pre-pandemic levels.

Mike Swasey: I’ve had a lot of questions, Brian, about the ArriveCan app. You know, specifically in Skagway, a lot of tours will emanate from Skagway and go up into Canada. And so one of the questions I’m getting from tour companies is, will everyone that gets on a cruise ship be required to fill out an ArriveCan app before they depart on their cruise ship?

Brian Salerno: That’s my understanding, yes. If the ship is going to call in Canada, and virtually all of them will — other than potentially the rare U.S.-flagged vessel that has no need to stop in Canada — there would be a need to complete the ArriveCan app as a condition of entry into Canada. And the cruise lines are prepared to check that upon embarkation so that it doesn’t become an issue during the course of the trip.

Mike Swasey: Okay, and then I’m told by Canadian officials that once they have filled out that ArriveCan app, it’s good for the duration of their cruise. So they don’t have to update it throughout the cruise. And then they can utilize that to, let’s say, leave from Skagway and go up to the Yukon. Is that similar with the information that you’ve gotten?

Brian Salerno: That’s my understanding as well.

Mike Swasey: Okay. Another question a lot of people have asked is, will everybody on board the cruise ships be vaccinated?

Brian Salerno: Sure, well, most people will be. You know, there may be a few exceptions, obviously, children under five aren’t required to be. There’s some question about whether, you know, children under 12 would be. But overall, the cruises that are operating to Alaska and certainly into Canada are going to have extremely high vaccination rates.

Most will operate at 95% crew and passengers. Even those where it’s just below the 95% threshold, which would characterize them as highly vaccinated, still above 90% in virtually every case. Plus, everybody getting on board the cruise ship needs to be tested. And there’s very limited time windows for obtaining that test. So everybody that you’re on a ship with is vaccinated and recently tested. And then, of course, there’s other layers of protection that are in place — new sanitation procedures and air filtration, plus the ability to respond if somebody does in fact come down with symptoms. So it’s a highly protected environment.

Mike Swasey: Brian, throughout the years, we’ve had a lot of international travelers come to Skagway. Will the cruise season this year look similar? Will there be an international flair, or will it be mostly folks from the Western Hemisphere?

Brian Salerno: Good question. You know, we’re seeing more interest in international travel now that many of the travel restrictions have been lowered. I think we’re still going to see a lot of international visitors to Alaska because it’s on a lot of people’s bucket lists. But predominantly, I think, you know, probably Western Hemisphere, at least to start.

An easing of restrictions at the border between Skagway and Yukon Territory will make it possible for tour companies to run cross-border excursions this summer. That’s good news for many Skagway tour operators that take cruise ship passengers into Canada.

But Skagway’s largest tour outfit, the White Pass and Yukon Route Railroad, says its trains won’t cross the border despite relaxed testing rules and faster processing times. On April 5, the railway notified its partners that it wouldn’t be operating in Canada this season.

White Pass executive Tyler Rose says there were a number of reasons why.

“We just couldn’t find a workable solution to it,” he said. “It was logistics, some restrictions. The uncertainty around wait times — it just wasn’t possible for us to provide the consistent, high-quality service without delays. And we thought it would create a significant disruption to the passenger experience.”

Yukon’s Minister of Economic Development Ranj Pillai says his team is disappointed in White Pass’s decision.

“We essentially went through a series of problem-solving on border issues and ensuring that we would have the ability for White Pass to come back and not have delays. And you know, we solved those issues. So yeah, this week was it was very tough to get that news,” Pillai said.

The Yukon government and Yukon businesses aren’t the only ones affected. White Pass partners with several Skagway-based companies to do combination tours that involve a train ride and other excursions like kayaking, bus rides or bike tours.

Sockeye Cycle owner Dustin Craney says he’s been booking tours based on the idea that the train would run to Fraser B.C., where his company would meet passengers for a bike tour on the Klondike Highway. Now he has to issue about $10,000 in refunds.

“I didn’t think we had kind of any kind of guarantee from them. But we definitely had been booking tours. And I think all the indications from both the kind of the cruise line partners from White Pass and from folks locally was that it seemed like things were coming together, depending on the Canada border situation,” Craney said.

But the work done by the Yukon government to relax border restrictions has paved the way for other Skagway-based tour companies to resume their trips up the Klondike Highway to Yukon communities like Carcross. Fears over long delays at the border kept some companies in limbo wondering if they’d be able to operate at all after two years of pandemic-related shutdowns.

Now some tour companies, including Chilkoot Charters and Holland America Princess, plan to resume bus tours into Canada.

Skagway Mayor Andrew Cremata says he was very concerned that thousands of cruise ship passengers arriving in Skagway would end up creating bottlenecks at local establishments and an overcrowded downtown due to border restrictions.

“As the season progresses, if more and more of the Yukon tour operators, the independents, can come online and offer their products to tourists, I think that’s going to alleviate that bottleneck pressure and offer a really awesome opportunity for the independent tour operators to get back on their feet financially,” Cremata said.

Pillai says a completed ArriveCan app will still be required to cross the border. However, passengers that completed the app before boarding their cruise ship won’t have to update it. He also says a printout of the final QR code from the app will be accepted at the Fraser border, as will a screenshot of that page saved on a smartphone.

Skagway’s cruise season starts on April 26. But things are expected to get busy when four large cruise ships arrive in town on May 17.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has lifted its risk advisory for cruise ship travel Wednesday following two years of issuing warnings to travelers about the possibility of contracting COVID-19 onboard a cruise.

In an update posted online, the agency removed its “Cruise Ship Travel Health Notice,” a notice that recommended individuals against traveling onboard cruise ships. Three months ago, the CDC increased its travel warnings for cruises to Level 4 — the highest level — following investigations of ships that had COVID outbreaks.

While the CDC has lifted its travel health notice, officials say it’s up to the passengers to determine their own health risks before going onboard a cruise ship.

“While cruising will always pose some risk of COVID-19 transmission, travelers will make their own risk assessment when choosing to travel on a cruise ship, much like they do in all other travel settings,” the agency said in a statement to NPR.

The agency says it will continue to provide guidance to the cruise ship industry in order for cruise lines to operate in a way that will provide “safer and healthier” environments for crews, passengers and communities.

News of the CDC’s decision to remove its travel health notice was praised by the Cruise Lines International Association, the industry’s largest trade organization.

“Today’s decision by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to altogether remove the Travel Health Notice for cruising recognizes the effective public health measures in place on cruise ships and begins to level the playing field, between cruise and similarly situated venues on land, for the first time since March 2020.

From the onset of the pandemic, CLIA’s cruise line members have prioritized the health and safety of their guests, crew, and the communities they visit and are sailing today with health measures in place that are unmatched by virtually any other commercial setting.”

The CDC emphasizes that travelers should make sure they’re up to date with their COVID-19 vaccines before taking a cruise, in addition to following their ship’s requirements and recommendations against the virus.

Travelers are urged to check their cruise ship’s COVID case levels and vaccination requirements online before traveling, the agency says.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Juneau’s urban Native corporation wants to help Eaglecrest Ski Area pay for its gondola project and expand summer operations.

Officials with Goldbelt Inc. could not be reached for comment, but city officials said the company is interested in backing Eaglecrest with up to $10 million. In return, Goldbelt wants a slice of summer ticket revenue. It’s unclear for how long.

“We can all keep our fingers and toes crossed,” Eaglecrest General Manager Dave Scanlan said to an Eaglecrest board committee on Thursday. “I think this potential partnership with Goldbelt is really, really exciting in many, many ways.”

The particulars of the deal would have to be negotiated, which requires action from the Juneau Assembly. The city manager could get permission to start those talks as soon as April 11. In a memo, City Manager Rorie Watt called the potential partnership a “remarkable turn of events.”

Last month, the Juneau Assembly narrowly voted to commit up to $2 million to buy a used gondola system in Austria. Eaglecrest officials said the gondola is the cornerstone of the plan for expanding summer operations.

But several assembly members were reluctant because they felt rushed, unsure about the public’s desire, and that they were unfairly leapfrogging other established priorities. The Assembly did not fund the installation of the gondola, which ski planning consultants recently estimated at an additional $5.5 million.

Scanlan said Goldbelt wants to finance more than a barebones gondola experience.

“The installation of [a] gondola, a small summit house and the mountain coaster are the things they want accomplished,” he said.

A mountain coaster is a gravity-driven ride, where people sit in one- and two-person carts attached to a rail or fed down a chute.

According to the estimates, that’s all doable with $10 million.

Eaglecrest and city officials were eyeing an upcoming local ballot question for possible funding of the gondola’s installation. In October, Juneau voters are likely to be asked to extend a 1% sales tax to cover debt financing for a package of city projects.

“I know a lot of our assembly members were very nervous about $2 million for the gondola because of the big price tag that followed behind it, and how are we going to handle that? If this partnership handles that, then it may create opportunity,” Scanlan said.

That means there could be opportunities for other Eaglecrest projects to go into the package. Scanlan suggested replacing the nearly 50-year old ski lifts. He even floated an idea for an employee dormitory, because the lack of affordable housing is often a deal breaker for potential seasonal employees. The ski area has been especially short staffed this season.

Federal investigators released documents on Tuesday outlining the circumstances around a fatal sightseeing plane crash last summer in Misty Fjords National Monument Wilderness near Ketchikan. The Southeast Aviation floatplane pilot and five tourists who had arrived by cruise ship were killed.

Investigators haven’t pointed to a cause for the August 2021 crash yet, says National Transportation Safety Board Alaska region chief Clint Johnson.

“This is not the final report by any stretch of the imagination,” Johnson said. “You have to keep in mind that this is a major investigation, so there’s a number of disciplines involved. Typically, for a major investigation, our policy is to open that public docket before the final report comes out.”

Among the hundreds of pages of reports, interviews, photos and data are observations about the weather.

Pilots who flew through the area shortly before and after told investigators that clouds were as low as 600 to 800 feet above the ground in some valleys. That includes where the DeHavilland DHC-2 Beaver crashed southwest of Mirror Lake.

In interviews with investigators, peers and superiors described 64-year-old pilot Rolf Lanzendorfer as a careful, safety-conscious airman who was not afraid to call off a flight for bad weather. He was an experienced pilot with roughly 8,000 hours flying similar aircraft. He had flown seasonally for Southeast Aviation since 2015.

Federal investigators note that Lanzendorfer was involved in another floatplane accident just under a month before the fatal Misty Fjords crash. In July 2021, the pilot struck a 1,500-pound buoy while departing from Coffman Cove on Prince of Wales Island.

A Federal Aviation Administration investigation found that Lanzdendorfer “acted carelessly” and skipped preflight checks for obstacles in a rush to return to Ketchikan for another flight. Lanzendorfer was the only occupant at the time and was uninjured in the accident.

He returned to work about a week before his final flight. Investigators found no record of any additional training before he resumed flying.

A report included in the documents says the plane didn’t seem to have any mechanical trouble before the Misty Fjords crash.

The NTSB’s Johnson says federal crash investigators are still working on determining the cause and issuing safety recommendations.

“And we are anticipating hopefully, that this accident investigation will be done and published, hopefully by mid summer,” Johnson said.

Southeast Aviation is a small, family-run carrier that until last year operated sightseeing and charter flights. It suspended operations shortly after the crash and has yet to reopen.

“We continue to think of and grieve with the families of those lost in the heartbreaking flight incident last August and are grateful for the ongoing support of the Ketchikan community. We will continue to cooperate with the National Transportation Safety Board and other agencies involved in the tragic incident,” Southeast Aviation said in a statement.

Ketchikan’s City Hall and City Council chambers got new names on Thursday night. Longtime city manager Karl Amylon’s name will be placed on the downtown city administration building, and the council chambers within it will be named after longtime elected official and newspaper co-publisher Lew Williams III.

But a third proposal — to name a park that’s home to an iconic piece of Native art after a white man — drew criticism at the meeting.

The patch of grass across the street from what’s now known as the Karl R. Amylon City Hall doesn’t have an official name. But it’s known in guidebooks and even on Google Maps as Eagle Park. A cedar monument in the park — “Thundering Wings” by Lingít master carver Nathan Jackson — depicts an eagle taking flight.

City Council Member Janalee Gage said the park celebrates Ketchikan’s Indigenous history.

“I believe that park represents the Native community in more ways than I think a lot of people understand. It has a history of its own. The eagle represents the land, and the mountain, and I think it would be very disrespectful,” she said. “As much as I think Len deserves a spot, I just think this is a bad call.”

Len is Len Laurance, a longtime promoter of the tourism industry in Ketchikan who died last year.

“Len Laurance was an icon. Oh my goodness, yeah — he was travel,” City Council Member Lallette Kistler said.

Laurance was born in Australia and moved to Ketchikan in the mid-20th century. In the 1970s, when a cruise season brought fewer than 70,000 passengers, he famously predicted that one day Ketchikan’s annual cruise ship visitor numbers would top a million a year. The 2018 cruise ship season proved him right.

A former Ketchikan mayor suggested the city honor the businessman’s contributions to the industry by naming the park overlooking Berth 3 of the city’s cruise ship docks after Laurance.

But Council Member Kistler said naming the park after Laurance didn’t seem right.

“It seems a little off to put a white man in there, I’m sorry to say. It feels like a Native thing,” she said.

Council members Jai Mahtani, Riley Gass and Abby Bradberry also spoke up against naming the park after Laurance.

Mayor Dave Kiffer said he understood the pushback. But he said Laurance deserved a prominent honor.

“Seriously, folks, you are looking at someone who basically envisioned — and through work of his own, helped to create — what’s paying all our rent,” Kiffer said. “And so I would hate to see any sort of, ‘Well, we could we can solve that with a little plaque somewhere.’”

He suggested an alternative.

“Something else that Mr. Laurance was in on at the beginning, 30 odd years ago, pushed very hard for, sat up at this podium and talked to us over and over and over again … was the waterfront promenade,” Kiffer said.

That’s a boardwalk connecting the city’s third and fourth downtown cruise ship docks. And the council seemed to like that idea.

“It seems like a bigger, more encompassing thing — more like he was,” Kistler said.

The council voted unanimously to send the proposal back to the city’s naming committee for review.

Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled Len Laurance’s name.