Sometimes there's a story that's just too fun not to mention. For instance, the debut this past weekend of one incredible-looking airplane.

When you live in this part of the world you're never very far from salmon. So it's no surprise that Seattle-based Alaska Airlines would promote our region's famous fish by turning one of its 737-400s into the world's largest king salmon. Alaska has come up with the catchy title of "Salmon-Thirty-Salmon" for this critter.

Is it a bird? Is it a fish?
It's Salmon-Thirty-Salmon!
(Photo courtesy of Alaska Airlines.)

The remarkable paint scheme underscores Alaska Airlines' long history of transporting Alaska seafood. This year they'll fly more than 30 million pounds of the stuff. And despite the challenges the airline industry is facing, Alaska Airlines sees great opportunities here. They're making some major investments to expand their cargo operations.

In fact, seafood demand is driving the carrier to increase its air cargo fleet by more than 50%. Part of that investment will involve retrofitting several 737-400s to freight configurations.

Still, I can't help coming back to that giant flying salmon. At Boeing, we know something about painting airplanes. But this is one amazing job. According to Alaska, it took a team of 30 painters in Everett, Washington, 24 days to complete the work.

The "Salmon-Thirty-Salmon" will be swimming out to a variety of West Coast destinations and some other points such as Denver, Chicago and Dallas/Fort Worth. Part of the goal, of course, is to promote wild Alaska seafood. But I also happen to think it does a nice job of promoting another fine product of the Northwest.