Will $77 Million Airport in Remote Alaska Prove Inaccessible?

[Angel Girl]

From alaskadispatch.com
By Ben Anderson, Jill Burke

By next winter the small village in Alaska’s Aleutian Island chain will have a new runway, long enough to handle planes carrying nearly 40 passengers. But the community won’t have easy access to the $64 million airport. The runway itself won’t be on the same island as the village, but six miles away across a windswept and turbulent strait fed in part by the notoriously rough Bering Sea.
And therein lies the problem: figuring out how residents and seasonal workers will get to the airport. A $13 million plan for a hovercraft to shuttle passengers from the airstrip to the community and back may not work, leaving local leaders in search of a solution. Now, they may need a helicopter. If they don’t find a fix by next summer, they could have a $64 million airstrip in the middle of nowhere.

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[Angel Girl]

Here's an update.
Alaska Airport Takes Shape Near T.V.s 'Deadliest Catch'
Looks like the weather hasn't only affected fishing...
From ENR.com By John Morell

ADOT contracted with Kiewit to begin construction operations on the $55-million project during the short Alaskan spring and summer; work started in March 2010. Construction equipment had been transported from Seattle to nearby Dutch Harbor, where the "Deadliest Catch" fleet is based, and was ready to be moved to the shallow beach at Akun on landing craft. Crews used the timing of the tides to land the heavy equipment as high up on the beach as possible.The original plan was to have an Akutan-based team transport the equipment to prepare an operational base on Akun during the day, then return everybody back to Akutan in the evening."Because we were dealing with lots of weather issues, that plan didn't work," says Holland. "We were losing days from our already short schedule, and it was decided to build a camp on Akun, so the staff was spending half the morning getting to the worksite."

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