Originally Posted by
Seat 2A
If you wanted to fly into the closest commercially served airfield to Denali National Park on board a scheduled passenger flight nonstop from Anchorage during the summer of 1999, what air carrier would you call, what airport would you fly into and what type of aircraft would you be flying on?
The only one that comes to mind for me is ERA which flew Twin Otters and even the occasional Dash 7 into the park airstrip, right across from the railroad depot. Service was spotty and dependent upon visibility over Broad Pass
BONUS: Era Aviation indeed operated DHC-6 Twin Otter and DHC-7 Dash 7 service at one point (and as some here may recall, I worked for Era in their helicopter division for a number of years from the mid 1980's to the early 1990's).
However, Era was not operating this service in 1999 nor was the equipment we are looking for a Twin Otter or Dash 7. But the aircraft in question is a turboprop. Plus, we are looking for a different airfield here located not too far from Denali National Park.
BTW, Era no longer exists. The fixed wing division was sold off years ago and currently operates as Ravn Alaska. And the helicopter division was subsequently merged with Bristow (which is another helicopter operator I worked for) with the Era name being retired. The merged companies currently operate as Bristow.