Alaska State News

Officials with the U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) told state and federal officials last month that they would be interested in expanding military access on Adak Island. The announcement was made during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Feb. 13, after Sen. Dan Sullivan pressed federal officials to strengthen military presence in Alaska.

The road would give King Cove residents access to potentially life-saving medical care, but it could threaten key subsistence species and create a dangerous precedent.

A fire at Sand Point's Trident facility broke out early Thursday morning, pausing the processor’s operations, including its fuel sales, which the small eastern Aleutian community relies on. The plant’s fuel sales were restored over the weekend. The community was informed Saturday morning via a VHF radio announcement that gasoline and heat oil sales were back on.

The U.S. Coast Guard removed a crewmember from a Norwegian cargo vessel roughly 240 nautical miles southwest of Unalaska Wednesday.A rescue coordination center in Norway contacted the Coast Guard around 7 p.m. Tuesday, requesting a medical evacuation of a sick crewmember on board the Fermita.

Earlier this month, commercial snow crabs started hitting Unalaska’s docks again, for the first time in nearly three years. The Bering Sea snow crab fishery reopened in mid-October, after billions of the crab disappeared and the fishery was shut down in October 2022. This season’s first catch was delivered on Jan. 15. Opilio, or snow crab, is generally fished in the new year and into the early spring. The season runs through the end of May.

Unalaska's U.S. Coast Guard Marine Safety Unit is investigating a fishing vessel that ran aground near Iliuliuk Bay. The F/V Northern Endurance was partially beached about three miles from downtown Unalaska, near Little Priest Rock on Thursday and was pulled free by the emergency response and salvage company Resolve Marine Friday morning around 9 a.m., according to Commanding Officer Lt. Lawrence Schalles.

Unangam Tunuu is taught in only a handful of classes in the public school system, and outside these sessions, the language is seldom spoken in everyday conversation. The struggle on St. Paul mirrors trends across Alaska. A 2024 report from the Alaska Native Language Preservation and Advisory Council, a legislative council that advises the governor's office, found that all of the state’s Indigenous languages are critically endangered, with some spoken by fewer than a dozen people.

Unalaska High School junior Cache Henning came within one point of winning the Alaska state wrestling title for the 130-pound weight class last weekend. Henning faced Mt. Edgecumbe wrestler Elden Andrew in the championship match at the Alaska Airlines Center in Anchorage. Despite the narrow loss, Unalaska Head Coach Rainier Marquez said Henning’s second-place finish is a major accomplishment.

A new state championship banner will be hung in the Unalaska High School gym, and it will be the first time a girls sports team is featured on the gym wall as a state champion. The Unalaska Raiders girls volleyball team defeated the Susitna Valley Rams three matches to zero on Saturday, claiming their victory as the 2A Alaska State champions. They returned to Unalaska Monday, parading across the island in a procession of fire trucks, an ambulance and a local police squad car, showing off their trophy.

For decades, King Cove’s roughly 800 residents have called for a road they say could save lives in emergencies. Neither city has a hospital, so residents rely on medical evacuations to reach Anchorage for urgent medical care. The Biden administration last week endorsed the proposal, recommending a land exchange with King Cove’s Native corporation so the road can be built. But that road would go through a federally protected wilderness area. While residents argue it’s a matter of life and death, environmental advocates say the road could threaten vital wildlife habitat — and set a dangerous precedent.