Thumbnail photo by James Brooks
With another runway project pending, more passengers need to fly into and out of Crescent City for the Del Norte County Regional Airport to be sure of the federal dollars needed to make that happen, Director Sean Rosenthal said.
The Federal Aviation Administration provides grant funding every year for capital improvement projects, Rosenthal told Redwood Voice Community News on Thursday. Increasing the number of enplanements from 7,485 to 10,000 annually could not only speed up the process, it could convince the FAA that the airport needs a longer runway.
Convincing Advanced Air, the airline that serves Crescent City, to offer flights to Portland is a viable option for boosting those numbers, the airport authority director says. But there are caveats.
“Last October I asked them if they would investigate Portland as a possible destination. They have a good partnership with us. They said absolutely,” he said. “But their contract doesn’t say they have to go to Portland. Their response is, ‘whatever the community needs we will definitely look at.’”
Rosenthal said he would get a better idea from Advanced Air and consultant Volaire Aviation about whether or not they think Portland is an option in about two weeks.
At a Border Coast Regional Airport Authority meeting Feb. 5, Rosenthal reported on a meeting Volaire consultants had with business owners as well as local government officials in January. The meeting focused on the airport’s strengths and weaknesses with the facility’s free parking, helpful staff and the region’s natural beauty being its strengths.
The airport’s weaknesses include its runway length — 5,000 feet does not allow for most aircraft currently in service, Rosenthal said. Passengers’ current inability to seamlessly connect with another airline is also a weakness, he told BCRAA representatives.
The Border Coast Regional Airport Authority is the joint powers authority that oversees the airport. Its representatives include Crescent City, Del Norte County, Brookings, Curry County, the Tolowa Dee-ni’ Nation and Elk Valley Rancheria.
The airport’s current carrier is Advanced Air, a Southern California-based company that has offered flights to Oakland and Hawthorne under the federal Alternative Essential Air Service subsidy since 2024. The airline’s contract is up in 2028, Rosenthal said.
On Feb. 5, Rosenthal told JPA members that of the 200 passengers that fly into and out of the region every day, only about 20 use Crescent City. Most go to Medford. Citing data from Volaire, Rosenthal said that the daily number of enplanements is only about half of what it was in 2007 when 46 flew out of the Del Norte County airport.
Portland is attractive, he told BCRAA members, because passengers can fly to “pretty much everywhere” with Alaska Airlines.
But on Thursday, Rosenthal told Redwood Voice that Advanced Air has to determine whether it’s feasible for them to fly from Crescent City to Portland.
“They have to be able to get a gate,” he said. “They have to be able to afford it. And from there, I know they would be talking to us about the viability as far as whether they would make any money. They’ve pretty much negotiated their contract based on what they’re doing now, which is why they don’t have to do Portland.”
According to Volaire’s report, Alaska Airlines connects to 54 different cities from Portland as of August 2025.
Volaire’s report also determined that in order to attract larger carriers, BCRAA would need to add 300 to 800 feet to the existing runway. Alaska Airlines could fly into Del Norte County airport, but without the extra length on the runway, it would likely only operate during calm weather, according to Rosenthal.
Advanced Air currently operates a Dornier 328 jet at the Del Norte County airport. According to Rosenthal, it’s one of only two airlines that does so. But, while they’re safe, the airport director says the planes are no longer being manufactured.
Expanding the runway is fraught not only due to the cost involved, and where the funding would come from, but due to environmental constraints — the whole airport is in the coastal zone.
“There’s only one runway that is even feasible and that’s Runway 12-30, the one that has not been rehabbed yet,” Rosenthal said, referring to the project to either rehabilitate the runway or totally reconstruct it. “This has been discussed and explored since Jim Bernard was the airport director and there are even maps and plans of potentially moving Washington (Boulevard) and potentially acquiring land.”
Bernard was the airport authority director from 2005 to 2014.
At the Feb. 5 meeting, BCRAA Board Chairman David Finigan said that a previous carrier, PenAir had flown into Portland before it left the region due to bankruptcy. Meanwhile, when United Airlines’ SkyWest served Crescent City it flew into San Francisco “because it was the United hub.”
However, increasing the number of people flying into and out of Del Norte County will determine whether runway expansion is possible, whether the funding is available to start that project and whether a larger air carrier agrees to serve the region, Finigan said.
“You have to prove that you have people who want to ride the airline,” he said. “If we can get somebody to stay here and commit to here, or connect with somebody that’s committed like Alaska — whether it’s Advanced Air or someone who picks up the next EAS or AEAS (contract) — I think that’s what we keep looking at.”
Finigan’s colleague on the JPA Board, Del Norte County District 3 Supervisor Chris Howard said the had spoken with Volaire owner/operator Jack Penning, who said that if Del Norte had a 5,800 foot runway, Alaska would serve Crescent City.
“What we don’t have is a 5,800 foot runway,” he said. “We’re in the same boat we were back with the Brazilian prop planes that (Finigan) was fighting with SkyWest and United Express back in the day. There’s a lot of lobbying we have to do both on the carrier side and on the FAA side.”
In addition to discussing the possibility of Portland as a destination, Rosenthal said the Border Coast Regional Airport Authority will conduct a survey of Runway 12-30. That survey will determine whether grinding and repaving the runway is necessary or if it needs to be rebuilt, he said.
Two years ago, BCRAA received nearly $7.3 million in FAA grant dollars to rehabilitate Runway 18-36. In 2023 airport authority staff approached each member agency for help to meet their required 5% match to receive the grant.
In August, the Del Norte County Board of Supervisors extended a line of credit to the BCRAA after a series of projects, including the runway rehabilitation project, left it with cash flow struggles.
On Thursday, Rosenthal said that is a mistake that won’t be repeated for the Runway 12-30 project. If the survey finds that the runway needs to be rehabilitated, the cost could be between $7 million and $8 million. The price tag could be as much as $11 million if the runway needs to be rebuilt, Rosenthal said. It could be three to four years before construction is underway, he said.
During his director’s report on Feb. 5, Rosenthal said the number of enplanements for January was 483, which is on par with what it had been for about 10 years. However, Advanced Aviation experienced 25 “controllable delays” due to mechanical problems — something the company vice president acknowledged in an email to the airport director.
