Alaska Airlines becomes first to BAN emotional support animals and will only allow service dogs

In two weeks’ time, no pot-bellied pigs, miniature horses or peacocks will be welcome on board Alaska Airlines flights amid an industry-wide crackdown on emotional support animals.

The Seattle-based air carrier on Tuesday announced changes to its service animal policy, stating that beginning on January 11, the airline will no longer allow any emotional support animals on its flights.

‘Alaska will only transport service dogs, which are specially trained to perform tasks for the benefit of a qualified individual with a disability,’ the airline said in a press release.

The move comes just weeks after the US Department of Transportation said that it will no longer require airlines to make the same accommodations for emotional support animals as for service dogs.

‘This regulatory change is welcome news, as it will help us reduce disturbances onboard, while continuing to accommodate our guests traveling with qualified service animals,’ said Ray Prentice, director of customer advocacy at Alaska Airlines.

Under the revised policy, Alaska will accept no more than two service dogs per guest in the cabin. Passengers will be required to complete a form on the airline’s website, confirming that their animal is a legitimate service dog, is specially trained and vaccinated and will behave appropriately during the flight.

Passengers who booked their flights before January 11 will be allowed to travel with their emotional support animals through February 28, but no later. 

The DOT’s new rule clamping down on emotional support animals that was announced on December 2 aims to settle years of tension between airlines and passengers who bring their pets on board for free by saying they need them for emotional help. Under a longstanding department policy, all the passengers needed was a note from a health professional.

Airlines argued that passengers abused the situation to bring a menagerie of animals on board including cats, turtles, pot-bellied pigs, kangaroos, pandas, and, in one case, a peacock named Dexter.

The agency said that it was rewriting the rules partly because passengers carrying unusual animals on board ‘eroded the public trust in legitimate service animals.’ 

It also cited the increasing frequency of people ‘fraudulently representing their pets as service animals,’ and a rise in misbehavior by emotional-support animals, ranging from peeing on the carpet to biting other passengers and flight crews.

The revised policy will force passengers with support animals to check them into the cargo hold — and pay a pet fee — or leave them at home. The agency estimated that airlines, which have been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, will gain up to $59.6million a year in pet fees.

The number of animals on planes took off several years ago, and a cottage industry grew around providing papers, doctor’s notes and even dog vests for support animals.

Under the DOT’s final rule, which takes effect in early January, a service animal is a dog trained to help a person with a physical or psychiatric disability. Advocates for veterans and others had pushed for inclusion of psychiatric service dogs. 

Airlines for America, a trade group for the biggest US carriers, said the new rule will protect passengers and airline employees while helping people travel with trained service dogs. 

‘The days of Noah’s Ark in the air are hopefully coming to an end,’ Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants told USA Today. 

Proponents of emotional support animals have been up in arms about DOT’s new rule, arguing that the animals help them with anxiety, post-traumatic or other issues that would prevent them from traveling. 

‘While it is no secret that we still remain far from a truly accessible transportation system in this country, the DOT rule will only serve to exacerbate existing inequities for people with disabilities participating in air travel and will instead almost exclusively accommodate the interests of the airline industry,’ Curt Decker, executive director of the National Disability Rights Network, said in a statement, as The New York Times reported. 

Defines a service animal as a dog that is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of a person with a disability;