State ferry Tazlina put into temporary service

The Alaska Marine Highway System has activated the dormant state ferry Tazlina for more than 30 sailings from Juneau to northern Southeast communities in February and March, filling in service gaps to Haines, Skagway, Hoonah, Angoon and Gustavus.

Given the shortage of regular ferry service across Southeast, there had been strong public pressure on the state to activate the Tazlina, a $60 million ship built in 2019 but largely unused to save money.

Bringing the 300-passenger Tazlina into service required putting together a crew for the temporary assignment and restoring Coast Guard certificates for the ship that had been laid up for so long. It took the state a couple of months to pull it together after publicly announcing it would pursue putting the ship into temporary service.

The Tazlina started service last Thursday.

The state announced it had activated the ferry shortly after it contracted with two private companies — Juneau-based Goldbelt and Sitka-based Allen Marine — to temporarily run smaller passenger shuttles to communities across Southeast, until the mainline ferry Matanuska could get back into service after repair delays in the shipyard.

Even with the Tazlina called into limited service, a state-chartered private vessel from Goldbelt will continue to serve Tenakee Springs.

The Matanuska returned to work last week.

The state’s contracts for fill-in ferry service included an agreement with Allen Marine to operate runs “as needed” between Ketchikan, Wrangell and Petersburg, at a cost of $11,499 per sailing. The ferry system has not called on Allen Marine to make the run, and it appears unlikely now that the Matanuska has returned to service.

The lack of ferry service has been hard on smaller communities. In Angoon, the state ferry brings in “everything from soup to nuts,” and Angoon Trading Co., the town’s only grocery store, has been struggling, co-owner Shayne Thompson told public radio CoastAlaska last week.

Thompson decided to charter a landing craft to bring in bulk groceries to supply the store until the Tazlina is due to arrive on its first run to the community later this week.