Money flows to upgrade Rankin Inlet’s cramped airport

Rankin Inlet’s airport terminal — which becomes overcrowded nearly every afternoon when flights converge at the airport — will be expanded as part of a multi-million dollar airport upgrade and improvement project. (FILE PHOTO)

Rankin Inlet’s airport can look forward to a package of much-needed upgrades in the near future.

Nunavut MP Leona Aglukkaq and Lorne Kusugak, Nunavut’s minister of Community and Government Services and MLA for Rankin Inlet and Whale Cove, were in Rankin Inlet Nov. 9 to announce that its airport will receive $27 million.

The money will go to improve the airport runway and electrical systems and to build a new taxiway and public waiting area at the airport terminal.

That will up safety and convenience for the 55,000 passengers who pass through Rankin Inlet’s airport each year and provide a boost to the local economy, the two said in a joint Nov. 9 news release.

“With tens of thousands of people passing through this airport annually, it is important to provide the safest airport possible,” Kusugak said in the release. “The fact that this upgrade will increase the opportunity for employment and education opportunities in mining is a bonus.”

Congestion is likely to worsen when the new correctional centre in Rankin Inlet opens later this year.

Charter aircraft flying to and from Agnico-Eagle’s Meadowbank mine near Baker Lake and other mining projects are also expected to add more traffic to the airport.

“In the Kivalliq, mining is the fastest growing economic sector and upgrades to the Rankin Inlet Airport will ensure this continues by making air travel to, from, and within the region more accessible,” said Peter Taptuna, Nunavut’s minister of Economic Development and Transportation, in the release. “The Nunavut Transportation Strategy calls for the expansion of Nunavut’s hub airports, and this funding will do just that.”

For the mayor of Rankin Inlet, the Nov. 9 announcement came as good news.

“Rankin Inlet is growing very quickly and we’re extremely grateful to hear this,” said Pujjuut Kusugak, adding that previous hamlet councils in Rankin Inlet had lobbied hard for the airport upgrades and terminal expansion.

Nov. 9’s announcement follows a 2010 report released by the Government of Nunavut, which said rapid growth has left Rankin Inlet’s airport in dire need of expansion.

“The terminal building is now severely undersized and congested and the main apron and taxiway are unable to accommodate arriving and departing aircraft without compromising safety standards and experiencing excessive delays,” said the report, prepared by LPS Avia Consulting.

The report called for an expansion of the terminal and the construction of a new taxiway, a new terminal road and a parking lot.

It pegged the cost of those improvements at $32.2 million.