Gravina Island is an island in the Gravina Islands

Gravina Islands

The Gravina Islands are part of the Alexander Archipelago in southeast Alaska. They are bounded by the Clarence Strait on the west and the Revillagigedo Channel on the east....

 of the Alexander Archipelago

Alexander Archipelago

The Alexander Archipelago is a long archipelago, or group of islands, of North America off the southeastern coast of Alaska. It contains about 1,100 islands, which are the tops of the submerged coastal mountains that rise steeply from the Pacific Ocean. Deep channels and fjords separate the...

 in southeastern Alaska

Alaska

Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...

. It is 21 miles (33.8 km) long and about 9.5 miles (15.3 km) wide, with a land area of 94.81 square miles (245.6 km²). The island had a population of 50 people at the 2000 census

United States Census, 2000

The Twenty-second United States Census, known as Census 2000 and conducted by the Census Bureau, determined the resident population of the United States on April 1, 2000, to be 281,421,906, an increase of 13.2% over the 248,709,873 persons enumerated during the 1990 Census...

.

The Spanish explorer Jacinto Caamaño

Jacinto Caamaño

Jacinto Caamaño Moraleja was the leader of the last great Spanish exploration of Alaska and the Coast of British Columbia. He was a Knight of the Military Order of Calatrava. Born in Madrid, he came from an aristocratic Galician family, whose homestead was near Santiago de Compostela...

 named the Gravina Islands group in 1792. George Vancouver

George Vancouver

Captain George Vancouver RN was an English officer of the British Royal Navy, best known for his 1791-95 expedition, which explored and charted North America's northwestern Pacific Coast regions, including the coasts of contemporary Alaska, British Columbia, Washington and Oregon...

 applied the name to Gravina Island itself in 1793. The name honors Federico Carlos Gravina y Nápoli.

Ketchikan International Airport

Ketchikan International Airport

Ketchikan International Airport is a state-owned public-use airport located one nautical mile west of the central business district of Ketchikan, a city in Ketchikan Gateway Borough in the U.S. state of Alaska....

 is located on Gravina Island across the Tongass Narrows (1/2 mile) from Ketchikan and is reached by a ferry

Ferry

A ferry is a form of transportation, usually a boat, but sometimes a ship, used to carry primarily passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo as well, across a body of water. Most ferries operate on regular, frequent, return services...

 service which takes between three and seven minutes and runs at least every half-hour.

Flora and fauna

A variety of wildlife and vegetation are found on Gravina Island including a disjunctive population of the Crater Lake Newt

Crater Lake Newt

The Crater Lake Newt is an amphibian subspecies of the Rough-skinned Newt. The Crater Lake Newt is found at Crater Lake, Oregon and limited areas of Alaska.-References:...

, a subspecies of the Rough-skinned Newt

Rough-skinned Newt

The rough-skinned newt is a North American newt known for its strong poison.- Toxicity :Many newts produce toxins to avoid predation, but the toxins of the genus Taricha are particularly potent...

, whose northern range is in Alaska.

Proposed bridge

In August 2005 the 2005 Highway Bill provided for $223m to build the Gravina Island Bridge

Gravina Island Bridge

The Gravina Island Bridge, commonly referred to as the "Bridge to Nowhere", was a proposed bridge to replace the ferry that currently connects the town of Ketchikan, Alaska, with Gravina Island, an island which contains the Ketchikan International Airport as well as 50 residents. The bridge was...

 between Gravina Island and nearby Ketchikan. The provisions were negotiated by Alaska's Rep. Don Young

Don Young

Donald Edwin "Don" Young is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1973. He is a member of the Republican Party.Young is the 6th most senior U.S. Representative and the 2nd most senior Republican Representative, as well as the 2nd most senior Republican in Congress as a whole...

. This bridge had been nicknamed "The Bridge to Nowhere" by its critics.