Alaska, Siberia plan flights

IQALUIT — It may soon get easier for Alaskan and Siberian Inuit to send each other postcards.

At their closest point, Alaska and Siberia are less than four kilometres apart, and many Inuit have family on both sides of the Bering Strait, which runs between the two countries.

But due to the lack of scheduled air service across the strait, mail between the two regions has had to travel around the world in the opposite direction to get to its destination.

That means a package being shipped from the Alaskan Inuit community of Little Diomede to the Siberian Inuit community of Big Diomede must travel nearly 40,000 kilometres — 10,000 times the necessary distance.

But negotiations between Alaska and Siberia are now taking place to allow scheduled flights between the two regions. That, in turn, will permit direct mail service across the strait.

Currently, only charter flights link the two regions.