The Alaska Marine Highway System connects Alaska, and on Tuesday, it kept Paul Myers connected to work on his seven-hour ride from Skagway to Juneau.
Myers works as a shop foreman for Holland America Line and Princess Alaska-Yukon Land Operations. He sent emails and took business calls during the stop in Haines, where usually, passengers lose all service. But low-Earth orbit satellite technology now allows access in mountainous areas.
“I think this is great,” he said. “This is a pretty long run from Skagway, right? I do a lot of business travel. As soon as you get up against this hillside, it’s nothing. Can’t even text. It’s really nice to have an opportunity to still work.”
The M/V Columbia began piloting Wi-Fi in December 2024, making it the first Alaska state ferry to provide internet service. It’s free to passengers while the network continues to be refined. Posts in the Alaska Marine Highway Ferry Travelers Facebook group have few complaints and recommend it.
Myers said it was his first time using Wi-Fi while traveling aboard the Columbia. For Kent Evans, it was his first time in Alaska. He was finally visiting from Rochester, New York, after the COVID-19 pandemic canceled his plans in 2020. On Tuesday, he sat in the dining room and used his iPad for entertainment.
“We did a cruise up to Seward and then Anchorage to see Denali,” Evans said. “Then I dropped my wife off in Anchorage because she didn’t want to do the drive. I drove back to Skagway. Then the only way to get from Skagway to where I’m flying out of is the ferry, which is cool. I get to see this twice.”
With his rental car safely stored in the car deck, he planned to fly home from Juneau, but first, he relished the sunny weather he had dreamed of for his cruise in late May.
“Last time we were here, it was rainy and you could hardly see anything,” he said. “It’s giving me a chance to see the mountains.”
He pulled up Google Maps to show where he wanted to go next in Alaska, a drive through the Brooks Range to Prudhoe Bay. Evans had been on smaller ferries down south, but he noted how unique Alaska’s ferry system is.
“It really is like Alaska’s own highway,” he remarked while passing through sunny Lynn Canal.
Meghan Ewers, a customer service supervisor, said she was surprised to be able to move from the solarium, lounges, staterooms, and bar, all while communicating on Microsoft Teams and Outlook.
“I was kind of hoping it wouldn’t work well,” she said, laughing. An unopened book sat on her table. “We took the ferry up in 2022, and the Kennicott didn’t have any Wi-Fi, so it was very occasional cell service.”
Ewers was taking the Columbia to Bellingham for her move from Anchorage to the Lower 48. She said she looked forward to having Wi-Fi for the rest of her trip and expected to arrive in Washington on Friday.
While the experience may have felt seamless on Tuesday, distributing secure wireless access throughout the steel-constructed Columbia was challenging. All of the ferries offer crew members limited Starlink service, but implementing it for passengers was a different story. The project ran thousands of feet of cable, placing 37 access points during the vessel’s overhaul in the Ketchikan shipyard, according to an AMHS press release.
The installation for the ship built in 1973, two decades before Wi-Fi was invented, was a state-funded pilot project that cost about $400,000. Future phases will expand Wi-Fi access across the fleet, starting with the M/V Aurora and M/V LeConte, utilizing federal funding.
On Tuesday, passengers camped in the sun, others streamed Netflix, but still, some opted for watching Ice Age in the Columbia’s dark movie theater with their phones silenced.
• Contact Jasz Garrett at jasz.garrett@juneauempire.com or (907) 723-9356.
