Two Juneau airport approaches are down, with no FAA timeline to fix them

Two instrument approaches to one of Juneau International Airport's runways have been out of service, and the FAA has given no timeline for bringing them back.

The airport manager told the airport board this month that staff had met with Delta Air Lines' flight-planning team about the outage, and that the airport is working with a federal lobbyist and Alaska's congressional delegation to press the FAA for a status update and a restoration date.

The missing approaches are the more precise ones. GPS-based approaches to the same runway still work, but they carry higher minimums, meaning pilots need better weather to use them. In Juneau's mountainous terrain, fewer usable approaches can mean more flights diverting when conditions are marginal. The outage falls short of a safety failure, but it narrows the options.

Staff are also weighing a feasibility study of improved approaches for both directions of the runway. The board meets Thursday to take that up.