Fly with dog or potbelly pig? Alaska wants more paperwork

TACOMA — Flying Alaska Airlines with an emotional support or psychiatric service animal will require three pieces of paper work starting May 1, the company announced Thursday.

Tickets purchased May 1 or later will require those traveling with emotional support or psychiatric service animals to provide health and behavioral documents for the animals, a signed document from a doctor or mental health professional. The documents must be submitted 48 hours before departure, the airline said.

Alaska Airlines said the policy change doesn’t apply to traditional service animals.

“Alaska is committed to providing accessible services to guests with disabilities and ensuring a safe environment for all flyers,” Ray Prentice, director of customer advocacy, said. “We are making these changes now based on a number of recent incidents where the inappropriate behavior of emotional support animals has impacted and even injured our employees, other guests and service animals.”

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