Governor Mike Dunleavy held a press conference alongside John MacKinnon, Commissioner of the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, to discuss the M/V Tustamena’s recent COVID-19 outbreak. He also discussed the recent travel policy changes.
Commissioner MacKinnon offered details regarding M/V Tustamena: “As many of you are aware, we had an outbreak on Saturday afternoon on the M/V Tustamena. She was on her first revenue voyage of the year, departing Homer and moving down the chain to Unalaska. It was in Unalaska, Dutch Harbor, where a COVID-positive crew member learned that she had close contact with a COVID-positive person at the beginning of the week before she departed Homer, was feeling some symptoms. So we isolated her and had her tested, and she came positive. At that point, we had already loaded 21 passengers in Dutch Harbor, contacted the Coast Guard, contacted the epidemiology team, Dr. Zink, Dr. McLaughlin, and chose at that point to disembark the 21 passengers on the ship.”
Also, while the state changed their travel policy last week, Commissioner MacKinnon offered details about what happens in the eight applicable airports: “At these eight airports, we’ve had contractors meeting the flights, interviewing the passengers, taking the forms, and either providing the test or giving a voucher for a test. This whole process began at 12:01 a.m. last Saturday morning. First flight arrived in Anchorage around 6:00 a.m. and the reports that came back after a couple of days of this were that it went off very, very well. I want you to realize that this is not an easy thing to do. Anchorage has 18 flights a day and approximately 1,800 passengers arriving.”
Governor Dunleavy said that the travel process is a work-in-progress: “The initial roll-out, the first flight, my understanding is that it was a little rocky. The system is getting better and better as the Commissioner said. It’ll get much better once we get feedback from yourselves, the people of Alaska.”