AKUTAN

The City of Unalaska has made an exception to its local quarantine mandate.

After the COVID-19 pandemic hit Alaska in March, the Unalaska City Council instituted a mandatory 14-day quarantine for anybody traveling to the island, whether by air or sea. But at their meeting on May 26, councilors voted to allow an exception. 

GCI says it won't move forward with bringing broadband communications to Unalaska at this time unless they receive a large grant from the USDA.

The company has put in an application for a $25 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service (RUS) to bring fiber optic broadband connection to communities along the Aleutian Island chain, where connectivity and bandwidth can often be unreliable or difficult to come by.

Local students and teachers will now have free wifi while schools transition to home-based education amid coronavirus concerns.

 Trident Seafoods has restricted access between its Akutan plant and the local town in an effort to prevent the spread of coronavirus. 

Akutan, a small city of about a hundred people, lies 35 miles east of Unalaska. It also boasts the largest seafood processing plant in North America. The plant, which is operated by Trident Seafoods, hosts an additional 1,400 employees, and is just a half-mile walk from the rest of the town. 

Trident Seafoods is investigating an ammonia leak at its processing plant in Akutan.

About 5,000 pounds of the gas spilled in late January, according to Crystal Smith of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).

She said the plant was conducting a purge of its refrigeration system when company officials noticed the coolant was gone.