May 11, 2016 – Whitehorse, Yukon and Ottawa, Ontario – First Air and Air North, Yukon’s Airline, announced today that they have signed an agreement to codeshare on selected flights operated by Air North.

“This arrangement will go a long way towards making this very popular route sustainable on a year round basis”, said Joe Sparling, President of Air North.

Codesharing is a standard practice within the airline industry. The two cooperating airlines can both sell and market seats and cargo space on codeshare flights. A seat can be purchased on each airline’s designator code, but the flight is operated by only one of these cooperating airlines, commonly called the ‘operating carrier’. The term ‘code’ refers to the identifier used in flight schedule, the two-character airline designator code, such as ‘7F’ for First Air and ‘4N’ for Air North.

“We are excited to include nonstop flights between Ottawa and Yellowknife to our network as well as having the direct Whitehorse link for our passengers and cargo customers”, said Bert van der Stege, Vice President Commercial at First Air. “Northern airlines need closer cooperation to improve service and benefit from efficiency improvements”, he added.

First Air and Air North will initially start the codeshare cooperation on the Ottawa – Yellowknife – Whitehorse route, currently operated twice weekly year round by Boeing 737-500. Air North will operate a third Ottawa flight for the period June 13th, 2016 to September 16th, 2016 on a Tuesday, returning Westbound on a Wednesday, with the same timings as the other flights.

The two airlines plan to add additional codeshare routes at a later stage.

Following the introduction of codeshare with Air Greenland in 2012 and more recently with Canadian North and Calm Air in 2015, Air North will be the 4th airline in the growing list of First Air codeshare partners.

“With the addition of Air North to our growing list of airline partners, we’ve reached yet another milestone in the implementation of our partnership strategy, consistently improving the sustainability of scheduled airline services in northern Canada”, said Bert van der Stege, VP Commercial at First Air.

“Canada’s Northern Airlines need closer cooperation in order to ensure sustainability in small northern markets and we are proud to be working with First Air. We are confident that we will both benefit from the efficiencies”, said Allan Moore, Chief Commercial Officer at Air North.

The first codeshare flight will be departing Whitehorse on May 15 and like all other flights, available for sale through regular channels at both Air North and First Air.