The Mat-Su Borough’s ice-breaking ferry may be headed to the tropics.
The Anchorage Daily News reports that the borough wants to give the ferry to the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
The ferry, which recently was put up for sale, has never been put to work in Alaska. It remains docked in Ward Cove near the Ketchikan shipyard where it was built.
The ferry was the result of a partnership between the U.S. Navy, which wanted a prototype for a fast military landing craft and the borough, which wanted a ferry that could transport commuters across Knik Arm.
It is costing the borough $90,000 a month to maintain the ferry.
