Alaska Airlines safety record

Alaska's last fatal accident on its own flights was on 31 January 2000, when flight 261 from Puerto Vallarta lost pitch control and went into the Pacific off Point Mugu, California; all 88 on board lost their lives. The NTSB found that the nut on the jackscrew that moves the tail's horizontal stabiliser had worn through because Alaska had not lubricated it enough, and cited the FAA's approval of longer gaps between lubrication and inspections. The FAA ordered inspections of the same part across the fleet.

On 5 January 2024 a panel covering an unused exit — a "door plug" — came away from a new Boeing 737-9 minutes after take-off from Portland, Oregon. The pilots returned to Portland and landed safely; seven passengers and a flight attendant had minor injuries. The NTSB found the plug had been refitted at Boeing's factory without the bolts that hold it in place, and put the cause on Boeing's training and oversight of that work.

Flights sold as Alaska Horizon and Alaska SkyWest are flown by Horizon Air, Alaska's own regional subsidiary, and by partner SkyWest, each with its own crews and operating certificate; neither has had a fatal accident flying for Alaska. In August 2018 a Horizon ground service agent took an empty Q400 without permission and crashed it on Ketron Island, Washington; he was the only person on board. It was not an accident, so it is not shown. PenAir 3296, which overran the runway at Unalaska in 2019 and in which one passenger lost their life, was flown by PenAir under its own name, with seats also sold by Alaska; it is not shown on the line.

Accidents at airlines it later merged with — Virgin America and Hawaiian — are part of those airlines' own records and are not shown here; since October 2025 Hawaiian-brand flights have flown under Alaska's own operating certificate. Alaska and Hawaiian carried about 47 million passengers in 2025, plus about 11 million on regional flights, and Alaska is registered with IATA's operational safety audit (IOSA).