Longtime Iditarod Sponsor Alaska Airlines Cuts Ties With Cruel, Deadly Race

Ready for some pretty fly news? Alaska Airlines—the fifth largest airline in the U.S.—has confirmed that its more than 40 years of support for the Iditarod will end after the 2020 race. The victory was achieved only after the airline heard from nearly 100,000 PETA supporters, met with our representatives, and faced protests outside its corporate headquarters.

When dogs used in the Iditarod aren’t being forced to run until their paws bleed and their bodies break down, they’re chained alone in the bitter cold. Here at PETA, we’re flying high over Alaska Airlines’ decision to stop sponsoring the race.

Really, what kind of person would want dogs to be raced to exhaustion, illness, injury, and sometimes even death?

The kind over at Donlin Gold would, apparently. While Alaska Airlines joins a long list of companies—including Coca-Cola, Costco, Jack Daniel’s, Maxwell House, Nestlé, Panasonic, Pizza Hut, Rite Aid, Safeway, State Farm, and Wells Fargo—that have stopped supporting the Iditarod, Donlin Gold continues to throw its money at the Arctic nightmare.

It’s plane obvious that the list of ex–Iditarod supporters is growing, and it’s past time for Donlin Gold to follow suit.

Dogs used in the Iditarod are forced to run about 1,000 miles through biting winds, blinding snowstorms, and subzero temperatures. More than half of those who start the race don’t finish because they’re too ill, injured, or exhausted to go on—and more than 150 have died as a result of the race, not including countless others who were killed simply because they weren’t fast enough or who died during the off-season while chained up.

A first-of-its-kind PETA investigation of two former Iditarod champion mushers’ kennels revealed that dogs were denied veterinary care for painful injuries, kept constantly chained next to dilapidated boxes and plastic barrels in the bitter cold and biting wind, and forced to run even when they were exhausted and dehydrated.

Urge Donlin Gold to Sever Ties With the Abusive Iditarod Race

Click below to call on Donlin Gold to help spare dogs even one more day of agony by immediately dropping their endorsement of the cruel Iditarod.