After 64 years, Kenai Aviation is ceasing operations in the state due to financial difficulties, according to its owner.

The small airline based in Kenai was the brainchild of Bob Bielefeld, who helped create the flying service in 1961, two years after he arrived in Alaska. The airline’s current owner, Joel Caldwell, took over in 2018 and wrote a heartfelt letter on the company website explaining the dire situation. As informed by a news report in Alaska’s News Source.

In the letter, Caldwell states the company is “financially insolvent,” citing the COVID-19 pandemic as a chief reason for its money problems. Caldwell wrote the airline had a “debt load” it hasn’t been able to overcome.

“Carrying that burden increased the effects of every obstacle that we’ve had to navigate,” he wrote. “When our plane was grounded for maintenance and not being able to serve Unalakleet this summer, not only hurt a community that I love, it hurt us financially too.”

The airline scheduled flights connecting multiple communities in Southcentral Alaska, including Unalakleet in Western Alaska and Fairbanks in Interior. A connection between Kenai and Anchorage was particularly popular.

Caldwell noted in the letter that the maintenance of the company’s plane which regularly flew to Unalakleet was also a financial setback.