The public advisory board for the Alaska Marine Highway System has recommended that the state call an end to the Matanuska’s 53-year career in the fleet. The final decision whether to sell the unseaworthy ferry rests with the governor and his Department of Transportation commissioner.
“There is currently no set timeline for action,” said Sam Dapcevich, the department’s spokesman.
The 408-foot-long, 499-passenger ferry has been out of service since the fall of 2022, when it went into the shipyard in Ketchikan for annual maintenance — but workers discovered extensive rust which would require millions of dollars in repairs to put the Matanuska back to work.
A contractor performed what was essentially a full-body scan of the ship last year to determine the extent of the “wasted steel.”
Repair cost estimates presented to the Alaska Marine Highway Operations Board this spring for the steel replacement and other overhaul work on the aging ship started at more than $48 million and escalated to $132 million if additional work and upgrades are included to allow the Alaska ferry system to operate the Matanuska to restore service to Prince Rupert, British Columbia.
The Matanuska would have to be upgraded to meet international safety standards to run between Alaska and Prince Rupert.
“One of the larger items is having to change out all of the cabin deck to get rid of dead-end corridors,” Dapcevich said.
The ferry system does not have that much money available for the extensive repairs and upgrades.
Marine Director Craig Tornga told the advisory board that finding that much money to put the Matanuska back into service would compete with the need to collect enough state and federal dollars to build a new mainline vessel for the fleet.
“We just don’t want to be competing against our newbuild plan that’s in the long-range plan,” he said.
The public advisory board, which is appointed by the governor, unanimously recommended in April that the Alaska Marine Highway System and the Department of Transportation “make all due effort to move toward the planned and reasonable removal” of the Matanuska from service.
“The only thing surprising is that it took that long to come to that decision,” said Robert Venables, executive director of the Southeast Conference, which was established in 1958 to advocate for creating the ferry system.
If the ship is officially retired and sold, it would join a list of four other state ferries sent to the scrapyard or sold to other operators in the past seven years.
Though the Matanuska hasn’t carried passengers in almost three years, it is providing housing.
“The vessel continues to serve an important role as a moored hotel ship, providing essential lodging support for crewmembers until the Alaska Marine Highway System can secure alternative accommodations,” Dapcevich said in an email.
The Matanuska, tied to the dock in Ketchikan, provides temporary accommodations for crew unable to find a place to live in the community’s tight housing market.
Alaska Marine Highway System Engineering Manager Troy Sherrill gave a detailed presentation at the April advisory board meeting about the process of evaluating the Matanuska’s condition.
He referenced 2023 work on another state ferry that required the use of 11 steel inserts at a cost of $535,000.
“The Matanuska car deck alone will require over 200 (steel) inserts,” he said. “If you want to do the quick, rough mental math on the cost, there you go.”
The ship would need almost 125,000 pounds of new steel throughout the vessel to replace the plates and sections damaged or weakened by extensive rust, according to last year’s inspection and contractor’s report
The advisory board “joins with all Alaska communities … who have benefited from the service by the Matanuska in expressing its thanks to the crew, staff and contractors that have kept her sailing throughout her 62 years of service,” said a motion drafted by board member Wanetta Ayers and approved by the panel.
• This story was originally published by the Wrangell Sentinel.
