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KANGIQLINIQ/RANKIN INLET - Residents of Rankin Inlet are pleased with the news that passenger jet flights to and from Winnipeg will resume in March, though they're still wondering why they were cancelled in the first place.

Last week First Air announced it would again provide space for passengers on its Boeing 737 flights between Rankin Inlet and Winnipeg, which it discontinued in September 2008.

Passengers walk past a First Air jet at the Rankin Inlet airport in January of 2007. - NNSL file photo

"It's good from where I sit," said Rankin Inlet mayor John Hickes. "It was good business news, having the service reinstated."

Hickes added the loss of the flights between Rankin Inlet and the nearest southern hub meant people travelling south had to compete for seats with people on medical travel on Calm Air or Kivalliq Air. Medical travellers are given priority, so other passengers risk being bumped if the flight is full.

The restoration of First Air's Rankin Inlet-Winnipeg service means faster travel south on the company's 737 jets rather than the smaller ATR turbo-prop planes. Such community flights land often, in contrast to First Air's direct flights.

Page Burt, who runs Nanuq Lodge in Rankin, said many people she talked to had switched travel arrangements to take advantage of the First Air flights. She said many people wondered why the flights were stopped in the first place since the company is now running them again.

Before the flights were halted, the trips between Rankin Inlet and Winnipeg involved a stop in Thompson, Man. Eliminating that stop made service to Rankin Inlet much more economically feasible, according to a spokesman for First Air.

"We're taking a leap of faith here that we will get the level of support we need to keep that route going. I think it looks good going forward," said Chris Ferris, vice president of marketing and sales for First Air.

First Air discontinued the flights after the Government of Nunavut awarded the contract to provide medical travel to another carrier.

The company said passenger service was no longer feasible, but continued to fly the route for freight purposes including Rankin Inlet's food mail program.

Before Sept. 15, First Air flew six flights per week -- "combi" flights of both passengers and freight, divided by movable bulkhead on the 737 aircraft. Since then the company has flown three flights a week of pure freight on the airplane type. After March 2, there will be five flights, again a mix of passengers and freight.

Ferris said reducing the number of flights from six to five and not stopping in Thompson made the route attractive to the company again. He also said the drop in the price of fuel in the last several months was also a factor.

Hickes suspects another reason: a representative of another carrier, Canadian North, told a recent meeting of the Kivalliq region's mayors the company would consider offering a Rankin Inlet-Winnipeg service. A week later First Air announced it would restore that route. Hickes said he and others in the community find the timing suspicious.

Canadian North's president Tracy Medve went further, accusing First Air of shutting down the route in the first place in order to embarrass the territorial government for not awarding First Air the medevac contract for the Kivalliq Region.

She questioned why passenger service was stopped but freight service continued on the same types of plane.

"They easily could have had a passenger position on their airplanes," she said. Reconfiguring a 737 between passenger, freight or combi is complicated but common. Canadian North does it 15 times per week, Medve said.