America has a new airline, and a new means of travel to / from Alaska, East Asia and the USA’s lower 48. In January, Northern Pacific Airways unveiled the first plane in their fleet, a Boeing 757-200. They hope to launch their first flight with paying passengers by end of this year, aiming to serve several major cities and establish themselves as a serious low-cost long-haul contender in the fiercely competitive world of airline travel.

Northen Pacific will base at Ted Stevens International Airport in Anchorage, Alaska, leveraging the airport’s empty north terminal and its eight empty gates. The airline is currently working with the U.S. Dept of Transportation to secure routes connecting cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York City and Orlando to cities in Japan and South Korea such as Nagoya, Osaka, Seoul, and Tokyo.

Birthing an airliner is a huge gamble even in good times. Just look at two recent failures of WOW or California Pacific Airways who both failed even with a strong economy at the time. Northern Pacific’s CEO Rob McKinney thinks that they’ll have more success. He sees it as a golden opportunity to establish something that may be too difficult or even impossible at any other time:

“In great booming aviation times, to get slots into busy airports or get gate spaces is nearly impossible, but the big airports are now welcoming us and looking for new opportunities,” says McKinney. “It takes a long lead time to launch a global airline. We see this as a time to get something established that would have been nearly impossible any other way, and we’re just optimists. We think that we can stimulate new traffic, and capture traffic that’s pent up that has not been able to go anywhere, as other airlines have scaled back.”

A qualified Learjet pilot himself, McKinney is no stranger with turning failing airlines around and bringing them back to life. He was formerly the VP and Director at Hawaiian airline Pacific Wings, which tripled passenger traffic in just three years under his leadership. He then moved to Mokulele Airlines where he was COO and helped them grow from a small air tour company into a fully scheduled commuter airline.

Northern Pacific is a subsidiary of FLOAT Alaska, which also owns regional carrier Ravn Alaska, who operates Dash 8 turboprop flights across the state and is being used as a platform to launch Northern Pacific (McKinney co-founded FLOAT is also CEO of Ravn). McKinney sees Ravn as a fundamental component of Northern Pacific’s stopover model, able to take arrivals from Anchorage out to explore other regions of the state. 

Why start with 757s?

The timing, combined with the facts that used aircraft are cheaper than new and 757s are readily available, is why Northern Pacific is starting with older 757s. “We look at the 757 as not Mr Right, but Mr Right Now,” says McKinney. “We can acquire them sooner rather than later. And for us, we really think the timing is the play for this opportunity to maximize the post-COVID world. The 757 is not only readily available but they can make the stage length too.”

McKinney’s vision follows the proven model of Icelandair, which flies 757 routes offering low-fare flights between North America and Europe, with the option for stopovers in Iceland. Northern Pacific is banking on the theory that if a one-stop service can work for them, it can work for Northern Pacific between America and Asia as well. 

“We want to create a hub in Anchorage to replicate what Icelandair has done successfully in Keflavik. Anchorage is the geographic midpoint on a Great Circle routing between Asia and North America. If you take any trans-pacific flight from almost anywhere in Asia to almost anywhere in the continental U.S., you fly right over Anchorage, so by us just doing a quick stop in Anchorage we’re really not taking anybody out of their way, and actually able to offer a more affordable price and a nicer experience.”

They also believe that going through customs and immigration via Anchorage will be easier than other airports such as SFO and LAX, which can see passengers waiting in very long lines for several hours after they’ve already flown a 12+ hour flight.

Their business plan is also modeled after the success of air cargo service at Ted Stevens International, which has become the world’s fourth busiest for cargo, typically serving as a refueling and crew change stop for jumbos flying between Asia and America’s lower 48. McKinney wants to replicate that model, but with passengers instead.

Their first 757-200 (tail number N627NP) in powered by twin Rolls-Royce 36-600 RB211 turbo engines, has a maximum range of 4,400 miles and first served with USAir starting in 1995 (which later became US Airways and eventually merged with American Airlines). It remained in service until American retired its fleet of 757s in early 2020, flying as N630AU and N206UW during its prior career. AerSalethen put it in storage in Roswell, New Mexico, until Northern Pacific purchased it in 2021.

The company has already secured nine 757s, but hopes to acquire three more in time for launch. Some will be former American Airlines, others will be former United, and each will hold roughly 180 seats, featuring a three-class configuration for first / business class, premium economy and economy class passengers. McKinney also says flights will provide fast wifi and state of the art wireless in-flight entertainment (the seats on display did not have seat-back IFE), and they intends to keep the Intelsat 2Ku inflight connectivity technology already installed on the aircraft to offer both captive content and streaming services.

Internet will be offered as a paid option, though Northern Pacific is weighing the idea of free access for the premium cabin. Every seat will have power too, as passengers always have their own devices such as smartphones and laptops to use, especially on such long trips. Service in the premium class of travel “will be fairly minimal with amenities and food and possibly enhanced internet but not lie-flat seats, touch screens or any of those types of things,” says McKinney.

Overall, the company is aiming for fares 15-20% cheaper than current prices at competing nonstop routes.

A cryptocurrency frequent flyer program

Northern Pacific will also support what they’re calling a “cutting edge” loyalty program that will be backed by cryptocurrency instead of traditional air miles, using Ravn’s cryptocurrency-based loyalty program, FlyCoin, and assumingits interline agreements.

“We believe that’s one of the things that’s going to set us apart, because instead of a point or a mile you’re going to get cryptocurrency that will never decrease in value, it might actually increase in value, and its tradeable into other cryptos or back into fiat money,” says McKinney. “Eventually we think all the other airlines will have to adopt it because that will be the expectation.” Northern Pacific is also hoping to strike an agreement that will allow merchants at their home base in Anchorage to accept FlyCoin as a form of payment.

A unique livery

The plane’s livery, designed by Edmond Huot, pays tribute to the company’s roots in Alaska. The theme behind the design is “We Are All Navigators”, and tying that to the journey and path everyone will take through Alaska. Colors and patterns represent snow, mountains and wind, with sharp turquoise winglets representing the Northern Lights. A spiral design on the tail represents airflow and softness, while two white lines on each engine symbolize the wings of a bird and ascension. A subtle but giant “N” is painted on the fuselage, and there is a tiny “N” atop the tip of the tail painted same as the winglets. A bandit mask also outlines the cockpit windows, which was done to modernize the old plane and compliment the bottom of the fuselage and engines.

The 757 may be a perfect fit for the company as they start out and grow, but it’s a 25+ year old airframe and unscalable in the bigger picture. Northern Pacific believes they can get to twenty 757 airframes before having to scale up, and they are already in talks with Airbus and Boeing to see what the next version of Northern Pacific will be. There’s only two that really fit the bill until they start scaling up into wide bodies, and that’s either the 737 MAX 9 or 10, or the Airbus A321XLR.

Lofty goals set for an airline that still has to fly its first revenue flight

Ultimately, he hopes to see Northern Pacific operating a fleet of 50 aircraft within the next 5-7 years, generating around 450 jobs in the short term (300 in Anchorage) and boosting tourism across the state, with Ravn as a major player in their model ferrying arrivals from Anchorage to other Alaskan destinations and helping Northern Pacific become a conduit for an influx of new visitors to the state, not just a transport between America and Asia. They want passengers to stopover and see more (and spend more money) exploring Alaska.

“The numbers are there of how many travelers, and that’s not giving any credit towards spurring new traffic,” says McKinney. “I just believe that if we do the right things with the right machine that it will be a success. We want to encourage people to spend a day or two here and go salmon fishing, or go ride a sled dog on a glacier, or just all kinds of things you can only do here in Alaska.”

Northern Pacific hopes to make Alaska a prime stopover destination

Iceland is now a year-round tourism destination instead of a seasonal one thanks to Icelandair and their relationships with tourism organizations and stakeholders. Northern Pacific hopes to do the same in Alaska, and will even offer packages encouraging customers spend a few days exploring the state, before departing to their final destination. But tourism there in winter has grown slowly over the last decade; it’s still mainly a summer tourist destination, so Northern Pacific will surely need help from Alaska to market and get more travelers visiting during their dark, cold and sometimes brutal winters. Talks are ongoing between the company and various hotels, tour operators and activity providers across the state to leverage the stopover market Northern Pacific hopes to create.

The company also intends to use an Icelandair subsidiary, Loftleidir, to operate three 757s for its initial Asia service, and they are not going head-to-head with larger competitors in the North Pacific like Delta and United, but instead hope to attract younger budget-minded travelers seeking a bargain price.

“If we can’t do it, then nobody can,” says Josh Jones, the company’s largest investor and chairman who is a serial entrepreneur from Los Angeles. “And that’s obviously an option, nobody can.”

One of many hurdles Northern Pacific will face is the fact that Alaska tourism has not really been marketed in Asia. Around 60% of visitors to Alaska pre-pandemic were via cruise ships, and Germany and the United Kingdom have been the state’s largest sources of foreign tourists. Strict Covid controls currently in place across Asia will also be an obstacle, and while air travel is gradually rebounding now, trans-Pacific travel has been the slowest region to recover. 

Additionally, Chinese carriers are itching to lure budget-minded travelers with cheap one-stop connections, while other startups such as Seoul-based Air Premia are offering nonstop flights to Los Angeles flying Boeing 787-9 widebodies and offering fares 20% cheaper than full-service Korean carriers.

On the other hand, there’s not much direct service to Alaska from Asia, or from non-hubs in the lower 48 for that matter, so the old belief that “if you build it they will come” could very well work in Northern Pacific’s favor.

“I’ve pushed the string uphill a lot of times in my career, and most of the time it has worked out,” adds McKinney. “This is the big swing for the fences that will really bring a positive service to people that can get them across the Pacific. We really believe that we are on the forefront of what will make air travel at least less painful, if not fun and something people are excited about.”