First Air to sell tickets on Air North's Whitehorse-Yellowknife-Ottawa flights

Yukon-based airline Air North has signed a codeshare deal allowing First Air to sell tickets on Air North's Whitehorse-Yellowknife-Ottawa route.

Joe Sparling, the president of Air North, says he hopes the partnership will help boost sales on the twice-weekly flights, which has proved popular with people in Whitehorse and Yellowknife but not people in Ottawa.

"Largely because they don't know about us," he said.

"First Air's head office is in Ottawa, and a hub for them, and I think they have sales channels and sales networks in the Ottawa region that we haven't been successful accessing."

Air North plans to add a third weekly flight for thesummer.Sparling says if the additional mid-week flight catches on, he'll consider operating it all year long.

The new codeshare will begin May 15.The two airlines say they plan to add additional codeshare routes at a later stage.