Jennifer Pemberton

The first baby of 2021 born at Bartlett Regional Hospital in Juneau came into the world at 7:50 on Tuesday morning: a nine and a half pound baby girl named Madelynn Rose McCallister.

Her parents, Alexus Forehand and Kevin McCallister, live in Skagway. They came to Juneau several weeks ago because they thought their baby was due on Dec. 6.

“Once we got here to Juneau, they realized there was a mistake,” said McCallister. “She was due a month later than previously thought.”

McCallister works at the Canadian border crossing in Skagway, and he didn’t have anyone who could sub for him at work. So he’s been traveling back and forth to Juneau on weekends since November. But even with that hassle and the extra month in the hospital, he’s still glad his daughter was born in 2021.

“I’m just glad 2020 is over,” he said. “In general.”

Subtract nine months from right now, and that puts us back at the end of March or beginning of April, which is when COVID-19 came to Alaska. Madelynn Rose is definitely a pandemic baby. But McCallister and Forehand were living in Georgia back then. They found out she was pregnant right as they were about to move to Skagway.

McCallister says he was relieved they moved when they did. Because there were very few cases of COVID-19 in Skagway until late in the year.

“Right around the time it was time to go to Juneau, we started getting our first cases,” he said. “So we just kind of stayed away from everybody.”

McCallister says he felt really safe at Bartlett. They got COVID tested when they were admitted to the hospital.

One of the perks of being born at Juneau’s hospital is that the first baby of the year gets a special keepsake. It’s a wooden cradle in the shape of a boat, made by the Emergency Department Director, Dr. Lindy Jones, who used to deliver babies at the hospital.

McCallister didn’t know they were in the running for a prize.

“We didn’t know about it until the ladies brought it to the door,” he said. “It is absolutely awesome! It’s a work of art. It’s got all copper nails. Everything has been hand cut.”

The couple has two other small children at home in Skagway. A boy who’s two and girl who’s three.

“We won’t be home an hour, and they’re going to be sitting in this thing with their fishing poles,” he said. “They’re going to fall in love with this thing.”

In some ways, 2020 was taken to a whole new level in Juneau. Our isolated location here meant that we were somewhat protected from the coronavirus, but as of mid-December, we have had just over 1,000 cases of COVID-19 in the city. Five residents have died. We spent a few weeks in April hunkered down in our houses. Schools have been closed since spring break. We’ve already worn through our original masks.

But that’s stuff almost everyone has been through. We also saw approximately 600 fewer cruise ships and more than a million fewer tourists. That is to say, we had practically none.

And that means that a whole lotta money that normally flows through our economy, just dried up. Those giant ships bring jobs, sales tax revenue and cold hard cash to our town for six months every year. There are parts of Juneau’s downtown that have been boarded up for over a year now.

It’s been impossible all year to predict what would happen next. In May, we couldn’t imagine what an entire year of off-season would be like. It ended up feeling like summer never came.

But, how bad was it? Will the industry bounce back? Will Juneau bounce back? Will there be a season 3 of Cruise Town?

Adelyn Baxter and Jennifer Pemberton discuss the cruise season that wasn’t and what Cruise Towns might expect for next year.

Almost everything we reported on this year falls into the categories of pandemic, election, racial justice or weather. We relentlessly covered the big events that defined the year. We started reporting on potential impacts of COVID-19 before it reached Alaska and eventually we reported on the pandemic daily, including the arrival of the first vaccine in Juneau.

We covered Juneau’s first all by-mail election and then the Alaska primary and then the general election and the glacially slow weeks of ballot counting that followed.

We were at the protest in Juneau after George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis — quite possibly the city’s largest demonstration ever. And we were at the virtual rally hosted by Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Tribes of Alaska with hundreds of others.

We were there when the beautiful new CCFR ambulance was unveiled with its new formline paint job.

We were out before the sun rose in early December when record-breaking rain caused flooding and landslides all over town and then we shifted our focus to Haines when it was clear that things were much worse there.

But first, some stories that are not about those things. These are the five most popular stories on our website this year and they are all the result of original reporting by KTOO reporters. And in my honest opinion they are very deserving of the attention they got.

Top Five KTOO stories of 2020

1. Neiman Marcus is getting sued for selling a ‘Ravenstail Knitted Coat’ for $2,500 (by Elizabeth Jenkins)

Sealaska Heritage Institute filed a lawsuit in April against Neiman Marcus, alleging the company copied a traditional Ravenstail pattern when it produced a coat that retails for more than $2,500. SHI president Rosita Worl called it “one of the most blatant examples of cultural appropriation and copyright infringement” she’d ever seen. It is thought to be the first time a business has been sued in the U.S. for copying a traditional Indigenous pattern.

2. Cruise ships dumped more than 3 million pounds of trash in Juneau last year (by Adelyn Baxter)

At a public hearing back in January, a Juneau resident listed a few of the items taken from cruise ships to the landfill last year, including bedding, furniture and even slot machines. It turns out more than 3 million pounds of garbage came off of the ships during the cruise season in 2019 and ended up at the dump. That’s concerning, especially since the local landfill is expected to be full in 20 years.

3. Mother of all jökulhlaups reported in Southeast Alaska (by Matt Miller)

Jim Moore was fishing for Chinooks in Lituya Bay in August. The water was muddy, full of trees and icebergs, which he says he hadn’t seen since the 70s. He said it was “spooky.” A National Park Service geologist solved the mystery by looking at satellite imagery and said that it was caused by water breaching a giant ice dam and flowing under a glacier and into the river — the equivalent flow of the Amazon River each hour. No one might have known it happened if it weren’t for Jim Moore’s observations.

4. The runway lights broke, but Igiugig guided in a child’s medevac plane with headlights (by Rashah McChesney)

In August, a child in Igiugig in Southwest Alaska needed to be medevaced, but the village’s runway lights wouldn’t turn on. People could hear the plane circling overhead, but it couldn’t land because it couldn’t find the runway. A local woman, Ida Nelson, got up out of bed and jumped on her four-wheeler to see if she could help. She called more than 30 people and they all lit up the runway with their headlights. The plane was able to land, get the patient and take off again for Anchorage.

5. What does this sign even mean? (by Jeremy Hsieh)

In July, a guy in Juneau was hiking on the Windfall Lake trail and there was a sign that said “Poop pumping. Hike at your own risk.” It had the U.S. Forest Service logo on it, but that was it. That was the whole sign. Jeremy Hsieh looked into it and learned about how the Forest Service hires helicopters to take human waste out from the outhouses at Juneau’s most popular cabins. Program manager Ed Grossman said that they don’t mention helicopters on the sign because “people are attracted to the show,” and if they know “it’s a pumping-human-waste event,” there probably won’t be a crowd.

---

We have four priority areas for our news coverage. Here is the most popular, impactful and important reporting for each of them.

Best reporting on tourism and Juneau’s economy

1. Cruise ship will arrive early in Juneau after canceled Asia sailings (by Adelyn Baxter)
2. Everyone got tested, but Alaska’s only cruise this year still came back with COVID-19 on board (by Jennifer Pemberton)
3. Seasonal workers laid off by pandemic get to work improving local trails in Juneau (by Adelyn Baxter)

Best reporting on the pandemic and its impacts on health, schools and society

1. How the ‘infodemic’ is playing out in Juneau (by Jeremy Hsieh)
2. Juneau’s hospital sees surge in kids experiencing mental health crises (by Adelyn Baxter)
3. They sanitized, screened, quarantined and they still got COVID-19 (by Adelyn Baxter)

Best reporting on social justice

1. A former student speaks out about racism in Juneau schools; administration says it’ll do better (by Pablo Arauz Peña):
2. Another staffer at Lemon Creek Correctional Center tests positive, as inmates ask for more cleaning supplies (by Adelyn Baxter)
3. Neighbors push back on plans for cold weather shelter for Juneau’s unhoused (by Rashah McChesney)

Best reporting on state government, politics, economy

1. More than a quarter of Alaska communities haven’t claimed state CARES Act grants. Why not? (by Andrew Kitchenman)
2. In close races, results in Alaska not expected for at least a week after Election Day (by Andrew Kitchenman)
3. Gov. Dunleavy believes President-elect Biden has ‘outside chance’ of becoming next president (by Andrew Kitchenman)

High winds, flooding and landslides caused moderate to severe damage in communities across Southeast Alaska Wednesday, as an atmospheric river stalled over the region and brought record-breaking rain.

“We’re seeing real heavy rainfall amounts all across the panhandle,” said Jonathan Suk with the National Weather Service in Juneau. “I know that some locations have set all-time records for the days, for 24 hours. We’re still sorting through that trying to come up with all those numbers but we are in the process of doing that and it’s looking like a very wet and unfortunately eventful storm system coming through as we also are seeing a lot of landslides, mudslides and flooding across the area.”

Haines was the hardest hit. Heavy rains washed out many roads throughout town, and landslides took out homes. Residents were evacuated by boat after a 600 foot mudslide took at least one home on Beach Road. The Haines Borough assembled a local search and rescue team and requested helicopter backup from the Coast Guard and National Guard.

The Juneau airport saw nearly five inches of rain in a 24-hour period — a new record for daily rainfall. High winds brought down a tree in the Switzer Creek neighborhood, crushing one home. Neighbors say the man who was inside is currently in the hospital.

City and state crews were busy clearing roadways of mud and debris. Many creeks and lakes were at risk of flooding on Wednesday with one to two inches of rain in the forecast through the end of the day.

Juneau resident Rhett Morgan said about 2-3 inches of water flowed into his garage.

“This is like the first flood that I’ve been a part of,” Morgan said. “I didn’t really know what to do at first so I went to Home Depot, and they were closed last night, and banged on the door until they let me get some sandbags.”

He said his neighbors have been placing the sandbags and diverting water since Tuesday night. Juneau’s mayor Beth Weldon showed up to help, too.

Nearly a foot of rain fell in Pelican over the last 48 hours. And heavy rainfall brought Falls Creek near Petersburg to flood stage on Tuesday — the highest level ever recorded on a stream gauge there. Petersburg saw over 8 1/2 inches of rain from the storm as of Wednesday.

In Gustavus, Fire Chief Travis Miller says the Salmon River hit its highest level on Wednesday since monitoring began in 2014.

“No houses floating away, nothing like that,” said Miller. “No major hills, landslides or slides of anything. … No life-threatening damage of any sorts.”

As of about noon Wednesday, he says water levels are coming up to some homes’ baseboards and door seals, and the river carved away a small embankment near city hall, but he hasn’t had to close roads.

Across Icy Strait in Hoonah, police Sgt. Joshua Huskey said there hasn’t been any catastrophic damage.

“Yeah, we’ve had quite a few landslides here in town, lot of debris in the roads. The drainage water systems have been flooding over the roads. It’s under control now, though. … It’s just wet and crazy,” he said with a laugh.

The National Weather Service models show the storm front finally starting to move out of the region Wednesday evening, but heavy rain will continue throughout the day until then. There are a number of flood watches and warnings active across the region and even a winter storm warning still in effect for White Pass, which is the only part of the panhandle receiving its precipitation in the form of snow.

The respite for the region will not come as clear skies, but precipitation for Thursday is expected to be “light” and the winds will die down “considerably.”

With reporting from Erin McKinstry, Jeremy Hsieh, Rashah McChesney, Henry Leasia and Joe Viechnicki.

State health officials reported 745 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday in Alaska residents and non-resident visitors to the state. This is a new high number of cases reported for one day in Alaska, and a significant jump of the previous high, reported last weekend.

On Sunday, Alaska reported its second-highest daily case count with 654 new cases reported. Twelve are nonresidents and the rest are residents of the state.

These numbers represent up to a 50% underestimate of the true count since state health officials say they don’t have enough personnel to process all of the data.

Alaska Public Media and KTOO talked to officials from seven hospitals across the state this week and all expressed concern about the state’s health care system’s ability to handle the skyrocketing number of COVID-19 cases.

And an increasing number of hospital workers are out sick or quarantining. At the same time, more patients with coronavirus are filling hospital beds. On Saturday, between suspected and confirmed patients with the virus, 106 people were in the hospital with COVID-19 infections. On Sunday, that number was 141.

It’s estimated that 1 in 10 patients in Alaska’s hospitals have COVID-19.

The majority of the cases reported over the weekend are Anchorage residents. Providence Alaska Medical Center, which is the state’s largest hospital, said on Friday that in response to the recent rise in cases, it has acquired a refrigerated trailer to be used as a temporary morgue, if needed.

The City and Borough of Juneau reported 14 new cases on Friday, including a small cluster of infections in students living in a University of Alaska Southeast residence hall. All residents of the hall were tested after two students tested positive earlier in the week, resulting in six total cases. According to a press release from the university, those students have been isolated.

This story has been updated with additional reporting by Alaska Public Media’s Lex Treinen.

In this newscast:

• Dunleavy issues emergency alert to Alaskans’ cellphones
• School district divided about start of in-person classes
• Rep. Andi Story wins second term
• UAS interim chancellor is now permanent