aleutian islands

A magnitude-4.7 earthquake hit the Fox Islands early Monday morning and was felt in Unalaska.

According to the Alaska Earthquake Center (AEC), at 12:21 a.m. an earthquake at a depth of about 53 miles hit 26 miles southeast of Unalaska. 

Natalia Ruppert, a seismologist with the AEC, said the quake was not unusual for the region.

"Last night's M4.7 occurred within a known source of earthquake activity," said Ruppert.

 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. 

A magnitude 3.5 earthquake occurred at Great Sitkin Volcano on Friday.

Since then, seismic activity has returned to lower levels, and no eruptive activity has been detected at the volcano – located 26 miles east of the community of Adak.

Hans Schwaiger, a scientist with the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO), said it appears the shallow earthquake was an isolated event, although small local earthquakes have continued over the past day.

While Dutch Harbor has been named the nation's top fishing port in terms of volume for the 22nd consecutive year, the port dropped from second to third place in terms of value.

According to an annual National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report released last month, the Port of Dutch Harbor led the nation with 763 million pounds of seafood landed in 2018, worth $182 million. But the value of landings in Naknek, Alaska, rose to $195 million. 

On Friday, Unalaskans received a surprising—and enigmatic—message from public safety: that community members should expect GCI cell phone service outages starting this Wednesday, March 4.

The good news first: those outages have been tentatively rescheduled to April 10. The bad news? Depending on the level of connectivity, GCI customers could lose some or all phone service during that time. 

GCI is launching a $6 million project to upgrade satellite service in 61 rural communities across Alaska.