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The Bristol Bay red king crab fishery has been closed for two years, and along with it, Bering Sea snow crab have abruptly disappeared, causing another complete closure. Together, the fisheries generally bring in millions of dollars to the fleet and the coastal Alaska communities that rely on them. Since 2021, when king crab closed and snow crab saw a huge decline in harvest numbers, fishermen have taken an estimated $287.7 million hit. Without those fisheries and without that revenue, more and more boats are relying on other work like fishing for cod and small amounts of bairdi crab or summer tendering gigs just to make ends meet. So when a group of Bering Sea fishermen recently heard they’d be getting paid less than they hoped for cod this winter season, they figured they couldn’t afford to just sit by. But that’s exactly what they did. When the season opened, they didn’t go out to fish…and it worked.

In our 2022 year in review program, KUCB's Lauren Adams and Maggie Nelson take a look at some of the most significant moments of this past year in Unalaska.

A typical December on the island brings about six inches of rain, but Unalaska has already received more than 10 inches this month; President Joe Biden is expected to sign into law a bill that renames a volcano on a small Aleutian Island after the late Congressman Don Young; and a movement to change place names with derogatory or otherwise offensive histories is gaining momentum across the nation.

A typical December on the island brings about six inches of rain, according to the National Weather Service, but Unalaska has already received more than 10 inches this month. If the Aleutian community didn’t receive another drop of rain for the rest of the month, this would still be the ninth rainiest December on record.

GCI connected its first Unalaska customers to its fastest 2 gig internet speeds this week, but most island residents will have to wait until the new year before logging on; the late Alaska Rep. Don Young is about to have an Aleutian volcano named after him, after the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to rename Mount Cerberus in his honor; and the National Weather Service still has a flood warning in effect, and there is still a potential for standing water and flash flooding in low lying areas.

GCI connected its first Unalaska residential customers to its fastest 2 gig internet speeds this week. And while some Unalaskans now have access to that fiber connection, most community members will have to wait until the new year before logging on.That timeframe is a little later than the telecommunications company had hoped — GCI had been planning for a launch by the end of the year. But for the majority of the island, that service is still weeks away. The company announced Thursday that its island-wide launch of high-speed internet will be rolled out in a “phased approach” and won’t likely happen until mid-January.

Excessive rain in Unalaska has led to a flood warning, and the city has closed several roads and public buildings. The National Weather Service said Tuesday between 3 to 3.5 inches of rain had already fallen in the last 24 hours and that up to 5.5 inches were possible. The one-day total precipitation — 3.76 inches as of 10 a.m. Tuesday — ranks in the top-10 highest on record.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council last Sunday approved a total allowable catch for the 2023-24 Eastern Bering Sea pollock fishery of 1.3 million metric tons. That's up about 17% from 2022, when it was set at 1.11 million, but it's lower than other recent years.

The telecommunications company has spent over two years working on an underwater fiber optic cable along the Aleutian Chain, and were weeks away from launching service in Unalaska when the cable was damaged in Unalaska Bay.

GCI’s fiber optic cable, damaged by a ship’s anchor in November, was repaired over the weekend, and the company says they are still on track to deliver broadband internet to Unalaska by the end of the year; a federal appeals court in California hears arguments regarding a land exchange related to the proposed 18-mile road through Izembek National Wildlife Refuge in the Eastern Aleutians; and human caused climate change is rapidly transforming the Arctic, and Arctic residents are now coping with effects more characteristic of other regions, like typhoons, wildfires and increased rain.