KMXT - Kodiak

A sharp rise in COVID-19 cases in Kodiak is creating major challenges at the Kodiak Island Borough School District, including forcing Kodiak High School to close for three days this week because of employee absences.

Kodiak Island Borough School District Superintendent Larry LeDoux said the high school closure, which started Wednesday, has allowed the school to get back on track. The students have been learning remotely, and are expected to return to school in person on Monday.

“Allowing the three days of temporary closure allowed us to catch up, fill positions, get a handle on contact tracing, and to see where this contagion was going,” LeDoux said.

COVID-19 cases are surging in Kodiak. The borough on Tuesday recorded its highest daily case count of the entire pandemic, with 99 infections.

According to LeDoux, there were more than 50 cases reported in the district among students and staff this week. He said Thursday that the staffing shortage has been so extreme, principals have been filling in for teachers in some buildings.

“As an example, in one of our schools on Monday morning, we were missing a principal, the secretaries, the nurse, the day custodian and the cook,” he said.

LeDoux said the district has taken the three-day high school closure to reorganize staffing. He said he expects classes will resume on Monday- although he does admit that the situation could change rapidly. He also said that the school is introducing a new tool in the fight against COVID: A new testing policy.

As of Thursday, asymptomatic students can leave school with a box of take-home tests, and symptomatic students can receive a test in person. That’s taking place at the high school’s main entrance, Thursday and Friday evening, from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m.
On top of that, before the winter break, over a third of the student body was voluntarily testing for COVID during the day at schools around the district. According to LeDoux, that level of testing has likely stopped a lot of cases in the high school.

Sue Jeffrey has a student at the high school. She, like many parents, isn’t excited about the closure, but says she sees potential benefits.

“As far as these first three days, I thought it was prudent move. And yes, it was. It’s disappointing. However, I think that for the welfare of the community, it was a good move,” she said.

The outbreak on the island has prompted the borough and city mayors to cancel or reschedule public meetings this week, and the borough will not be allowing in-person attendance at its upcoming meeting next Monday. The hospital has also begun limiting visitor access and may consider limiting outpatient services based on positive cases among staff.

Testing in the community has been pushed to its limit too. A social media post by the Kodiak Area Native Association health clinic said test results and phone calls to COVID-positive patients have been delayed by the sheer number of positive tests.

The Emergency Operations Center in Kodiak reported 227 new cases in its Wednesday weekly update, with 175 of those coming in a 48-hour period. The weekly total is up 365% from the week prior.

Earlier this year, the Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository in Kodiak embarked on a project to chronicle traditional Alutiiq stories and legends. That effort has finally borne fruit with the release of “Unigkuat—Kodiak Alutiiq Legends” on Thursday, according to the museum’s language and culture manager Dehrich Chya.

“It’s hard to say when exactly the idea came about because it’s something that I know that I’ve wanted to see it and many people here in the museum and in our community have wanted to see,” Chya said. “And it’s just something that we finally had an opportunity to apply for a project.”

Using a grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts, work on the storybook began in February. It tells 62 stories in 279 pages, complete with illustrations from 31 local artists.

“Not every story has an illustration in it. But we do have throughout the book illustrations for some of the different stories in there.” Chya said.

Chya said those stories are separated by topics — stories about the natural world, creation tales, animals, transformation and shaman tales.

A digital edition will soon be available on the Alutiiq Museum’s website and hard copies will be sold in the gift shop. Chya says the museum is working on a monthly podcast with Kodiak Island residents telling the stories from the book.

It’s official: the Tustumena is finally being replaced. The over $200 million project was announced Saturday by Gov. Dunleavy during a visit to Kodiak.

“We’re going to be directing the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities to move forward with replacing the Tustumena that has served Alaska and has been homeport here in Kodiak since 1964,” Dunleavy said.

With a design 90% completed and an estimated five years to award a contract and build the new ferry, delivery is expected in 2027. The new ferry will run along the Tustumena’s current route from Homer to Kodiak and out the Aleutian chain to Dutch Harbor.

The governor said the replacement vessel would be larger — increasing its passenger capacity to carry 250 people plus crew. It would also have deck space for 18 more vehicles for a total of 52 cars and trucks.

If it’s completed on time, it would be replacing a vessel that’s 62 years old. The Tustumena needs at least $2 million in maintenance every year, and the governor also announced an $8 million upgrade just to keep it running until the new ferry is ready.

The Tustumena replacement has been a years-old political project in coastal Alaska. Decades of braving some of the fiercest seas in U.S. coastal waters have taken their toll, and the vessel requires frequent maintenance. House Speaker Louise Stutes of Kodiak says it’s been a long time coming.

“Anybody that knows me knows that the marine highway has been one of my major focuses because it’s just so important to rural coastal Alaskans. And I just want to, again, give the governor and his administration a big thank you, for hearing us. He heard Alaskans, he heard Kodiakans, he heard people saying, ‘this is important to us,” Stutes said.

The current estimate for the total cost of the new ferry is between $200 and $250 million, according to DOT. That funding will be paid over a five-year period, using regular federal infrastructure dollars that’s also used for highways and bridges. That federal pot of money available to tap has grown considerably after President Biden signed a trillion-dollar infrastructure bill Nov. 15, according to DOT.

As per state law, the new ferry will be named for an Alaska glacier, with the name selected through an essay contest for Alaska students.

The project hasn’t been put out to bid, and it’s not known where the new ferry would be built.

The waters off Kodiak may soon host another seaweed farm.

Last week, the Department of Natural Resources announced a new proposed 10-year lease of a 14-acre kelp farm up for public comment.

Kodiak is at the center of a growing community of Alaska seaweed farmers, said Brent Reynolds, a natural resource specialist with the department.

“The increase is very similar to other areas within Southcentral,” he said. “In the last few years, there has been a definite increase of interest for aquatic farms, for requests for information about aquatic farms, the application process, the overall process of what goes into it.”

The new lease near Kodiak was requested by Chloe Ivanoff, Clifton Ivanoff and Hailey Thompson, doing business as Kelp Island Alaska. The farm would be east of Holiday Island, less than a mile from the city shoreline.

Chloe Ivanoff grew up in Kodiak, in a fishing family, and studied aquaculture in a class put on by Alaska Sea Grant last spring.

“There’s a lot we have to learn about it,” she said. “There’s a couple farms in Alaska but as it’s pretty small, the information that’s out there is often word of mouth and who you know.”

According to Ivanoff, the kelp would likely be for sale to an in-state buyer, who would process the kelp and sell it in different seafood products. That’s a common strategy for other local kelp farms.

The public comment period on the proposed farm closes on Jan. 3 at 5 p.m.

After that, there’s a final finding and a decision is reached. Then there’s an appeal period, during which concerned citizens or the potential farmers can appeal the Department of Natural Resources’ decision.

The process would take at least two months.

If approved, the farm would join six other seaweed farms in the Kodiak Island area, with four of those being in the vicinity of the City of Kodiak.

A copy of the Department of Natural Resources notice and information on how to submit a public comment can be found online.

Astra Aerospace successfully launched an experimental rocket Friday evening from Kodiak Island’s Pacific Spaceport Complex.

The 40-foot rocket lifted off shortly after 9 p.m. shooting more than 300 miles upward into the night sky. The launch’s mission was to test the deployment of a dummy payload. It was critical milestone for Astra, a company that hinges their business model on the ability to deploy small satellites at a relatively low-cost.

This rocket was the first successful flight of the Rocket 3.0, and according to Astra the focus is now switching from testing and development to manufacture. It was the sixth in a series of launches by Astra at the state-owned Alaska Aerospace Corporation which owns and operates the rocket complex on Kodiak’s Narrow Cape.

“Reaching orbit is a historic milestone for Astra,” Chris Kemp, head of Astra, said in a statement. “We can now focus on delivering for our customers and scaling up rocket production and launch cadence.”

The Alameda, California-based company says it hasn’t been easy getting to this point. On Aug. 28, Astra tested an earlier version of the rocket that had to be aborted a few hundred yards after liftoff. Friday’s launch was redesigned to ensure all five thrusters fired correctly, the company said.

Kodiak Republican House Speaker Louise Stutes has announced two appointees to a new state ferry oversight board. That’s according to a Monday press release from the Alaska House Coalition.

Shirley Marquardt and Wanetta Ayers will be stepping up to staff the recently formed Alaska Marine Highway Operations Board.

Marquardt served on the Marine Transportation Advisory board for nine years, representing southwest Alaska. She was formerly mayor of Unalaska and has over forty years’ experience in marine transportation and the seafood industries. Marquardt was also the marine highway’s executive director under Gov. Bill Walker.

Wanetta Ayers also has previous experience on the Marine Transportation Advisory Board. She was involved with the Alaska Marine Highway Reshaping Work Group and has decades of experience in the tourism and economic development of Alaska’s coastal communities, the release said.

They will be joined by Gov. Dunleavy’s appointees, former Kodiak lawmaker Alan Austerman, Kodiak Island village corporation executive Cynthia Burns and Norm Carson, a retired Alaska State Trooper who lives in Pelican.

Alaska Senate President Peter Micciche has yet to announce his appointees to the nine-member board.