KUAC - Fairbanks

Members of an ad-hoc group called Advocates for Safe Alaska Highways say a mining company’s trucking plan will endanger the lives of people who live along and drive the 240-mile route from the Manh Choh mine near Tetlin to Fort Knox.

Kinross Gold will hold two public meetings this week to talk about its plans to develop the mine near Tetlin and haul ore from there by truck to the mill at its Fort Knox mine north of Fairbanks. Opponents of the trucking plan say they’ll voice their concerns about the plans during those meetings.

“Our group is focused on two things,” said Gary Wilken, a Fairbanks resident and one of the organizers of group. “One is safety.”

The group hopes to convince company officials to reconsider their plan to run up to 192 trucks a day along the route, each of which will be up to 120 feet long pulling two trailers and weighing some 70 tons.

“Secondly,” Wilken said, “and most importantly, we want to try to (convey) the sense that there must be alternative to this extraordinary 500-mile round trip hauling rock from Tetlin to Fort Knox.”

Members of the group propose three alternatives in a document they’ve produced and begun to circulate. They include Kinross building a mill at the mine, developing a rail link or building an industrial road to keep the trucks off the highways.

Wilken says the group looks forward to talking to Kinross officials about their proposals

“We haven’t really been able to sit down and have a critical analysis of what their plan may or may not be,” he said.

Wilken says the group wants to know more about the company’s plan for the last segment of the route, from Fairbanks to Fort Knox. They say the state transportation department restricts trucks pulling double trailers on the Steese Highway. And that means Kinross will have to decouple the trailers and haul them one at a time to the mill, which they say will require up to 384 single-trailer truck trips daily on that segment.

A Kinross Gold spokesperson said in an email Monday that company officials haven’t made final decisions on the trucking plan. And that they strongly prefer to run the double trailers along the whole route.

Wilken says members of the group also believe the trucking plan will require more and ongoing maintenance to repair damage to the roads inflicted by trucks. And they’re concerned about the impacts on Alaska Highway bridges that were built in the 1940s. They say the highways are already heavily trafficked by trucks hauling fuel and supplies, as well as slow-moving Army convoys and recreational vehicles.

The Kinross spokesperson said in a followup email Thursday that the document compiled by Advocates for Safe Alaska Highways has “scenarios that are intended to generate fear.”

The spokesperson added that during Tuesday’s meeting in Fairbanks, company officials “will be sharing more details about our plan and correcting and clarifying much of the misinformation included in the document.”

Tuesday’s meeting is scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. at the Pioneer Park Civic Center in Fairbanks. Wednesday’s meeting, in Tok, will begin at 5 p.m. at Fast Eddy’s Restaurant.

Kinross officials announced Monday that the public also can attend the meetings by phone or online. The company posted that information to its Facebook page, along with the telephone number to call and a link to connect to the meeting online via Zoom.

Update — Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2:48 p.m.

Alaska State Troopers say investigators located the mother of the newborn who was found New Year’s Eve in a cardboard box at a Fairbanks intersection.

Troopers say the mother, who is a minor, was brought to a hospital in the Fairbanks area for an evaluation and medical care.

“The investigation into the circumstances surrounding the baby being abandoned is ongoing, and no criminal charges have been filed at this time,” troopers wrote in an online dispatch.

Original story – Wednesday, Jan. 5, 12:43 p.m.

Efforts to find the parents of a baby left in a cardboard box on a west Fairbanks street corner on New Year’s Eve continue.

Alaska State Troopers say they are pursuing all avenues, including DNA analysis, to find the family of the newborn — whose name is Teshawn, according to a letter left with the child.

The baby was found near a bank of mailboxes at the intersection of Dolphin Way and Chena Point Avenue. The note refers to parents who lived nearby on Cormorant Street, but troopers say the newborn may have come from a different location in town.

The note said the family could not care for the baby, who was wrapped in a blanket inside the box. Troopers say the child appears to have been found shortly after being left.

The child remains in good health and is being cared for by the state Office of Children’s Services.

Moose have been coming into Carla Dekle’s yard and munching on willows every winter since she moved into her home near Delta Junction back in the 1990s.

“We have several cows that always come back every winter that are pregnant, and sometimes they’ve got babies with them,” she said.

But Dekle had to deal with a much different kind of moose encounter on Monday, when an aggressive bull and cow showed up in the yard.

“They were just very, very aggressive. I have never seen this before, and I’ve lived here over 26 years,” she said.

The winter storms that pounded the Interior last month have made life difficult for both people and wildlife, especially moose. The deep snow and hard icy crust makes it difficult for moose to forage, so they’re coming out of the woods and into human-populated areas to find food and refuge. And some have become aggressive and attacked people, biologists and law enforcement officials say.

An Alaska State Troopers spokesperson said they’d gotten several reports of aggressive moose encounters, two of which involved injuries, including a 67-year-old Delta-area resident who sustained broken bones and was taken to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital for treatment.

Dekle says the female charged her roommate when he went out to get some firewood. When she stepped out on to the porch a few minutes later, the moose lunged at her, too.

“She was probably 30 feet away from me at the time she charged. And she was here in it seemed like three big steps,” she said.

She says the bull then ran over and attacked a sled dog they’d tied up out in the yard.

“I’m screaming and yelling for my roommate to grab a gun, because I was not going to let him trample a dog,” she said.

Dekle says the female was right next to the porch when she flung the front door open so her roommate could get a good shot with his .41-caliber Magnum pistol.

“My roommate just started firing, because we didn’t have no choice. She was going to come through that door,” she said.

She says the female staggered and dropped, and the roommate then reloaded and killed the bull. Dekle says the trooper who came out to the house told her that moose were becoming very aggressive — because they’re starving.

“They are eating everything they can get a hold of,” she said.

Tony Hollis, a wildlife biologist with the state Fish and Game Department office in Fairbanks, said deep snow with a crust from rain in the middle is making it difficult for moose to move around and find food.

“The moose are having a hard time getting around and it’s just real stressful on them and making them ornery,” he said.

Hollis said Monday he’s been getting a lot of reports about run-ins with aggressive moose from all around the Interior.

“This morning we had 17 voicemails on the machine from the weekend, and 10 of them were moose issues,” he said.

Hollis said people should always keep an eye out for moose and stay away from them, especially now.

“People out and about just need to realize that this winter, from here on out, you could deal with an ornery moose that doesn’t want to get off the trail. And the more stressed they are, the tougher shape they’re in, the more ornery they’re going to be,” he said.

A Delta Junction man pleaded guilty on Monday to two federal charges of threatening to kill Alaska’s U.S. Senators.

Jay Allen Johnson signed a plea agreement that states he’s guilty of threatening to murder Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Sen. Dan Sullivan in separate voicemail messages he left in September.

Those are two of six counts listed on a Nov. 19 indictment. In return for Johnson’s guilty pleas, Assistant U.S. Attorney Ryan Tansey agreed to not pursue the other counts, which include allegations of weapons misconduct related to seven firearms that federal officers seized during a raid on Johnson’s home in Delta Junction in October. Federal law prohibits him from owning or having access to firearms because he’s a convicted felon.

The 65-year-old Johnson was arrested Oct. 4 and since then has been held at Fairbanks Correction Center.

Johnson’s attorney, Jason Weiner, didn’t return a phone call for comment, and neither did Murkowski or Sullivan.

A U.S. Attorney’s Office spokesperson said Johnson is scheduled to be sentenced on April 8. He faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release after he serves jail time.

The Interior is digging out from the region’s second major storm this week.

Another foot of snow fell in Fairbanks Tuesday into Wednesday, and the community continues to deal with rough road conditions and power outages caused by falling trees.

The new snow was accompanied by high winds that caused drifting. Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Bryce Ward says plowing operations are trying to catch up.

“It is still going to be sometime before all of our roads are cleared,” he said.

According to the state Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, crews focused Wednesday on opening up access but cautioned of narrow lanes until they can get back and fully clear roadways. The situation is worse outside town, including over Steese Highway Summits where work continues to open the road and get plows beyond to Central and Circle.

Meanwhile, several hundred Golden Valley Electric customers remained without electricity as of Wednesday night due to storm bent and broken trees on power lines and poles. Robert Altman and his wife are among Eielson Farm Road area residents who haven’t had power since Sunday.

“The only thing that’s been helping us is we have a little Craftsman generator that we bought from Home Depot,” he said.

Altman said the 2,200-watt portable generator is enough to keep their Toyostove heater and other essentials powered.

“I also raise chickens so we have our chicken coop plugged in, and then we alternate the plug-ins for the refrigerator,” he said. “You know we’ll plug it in during the day and then unplug it at night when we aren’t going to be opening it.  We go and get water from the regular water place like everybody else. My wife’s been cooking on a little butane cook stove.”

Altman said nine area power poles located well off the road are damaged.

“They need a bulldozer to get to where the poles are,” he said.

The Eielson Farm Road outage is one of over 100 that Golden Valley Electric Association is working to fix. An online post from the utility said it has 18 crews in the field and nine more coming up from Anchorage with the goal of restoring service to all customers by late Friday. It notes that some customers have sustained damage to private power equipment that the utility is not responsible for.

Meanwhile, temperatures are forecast to cool, and Mayor Ward said the borough’s emergency operations center is working with the Red Cross to help any residents without heat.

“To provide housing vouchers for folks that are without power that are not able to get that power re-secured,” he said.

Ward said no one had requested assistance as of Wednesday night but encourages people to check on their neighbors

While borough emergency and road service operations are functioning, many other borough services including library and recreation remain shut down due to storm impacts.

The weather pattern that funneled so much moisture into the Interior is shifting, and no additional storms are forecast. National Weather Service meteorologist Bobby Bianco said Fairbanks’ December 2021 snowfall is nearing a record.

“We’ve had around 47 inches of snow, the second snowiest on record,” Bianco said.

There’s a chance of a little light snow Friday, which could push Fairbanks past the December record of 50.4 inches set in 1984. The last week has included both snow and rain and Bianco said this month’s total water equivalent of 6 inches is already a Fairbanks December record.

“Astronomically high,” Bianco said. “It’s definitely top three wettest months on record, including summer months.”

December’s snow and rain have also helped make 2021 Fairbanks’ wettest year.

National Weather Service weather experts are cautioning residents of Interior Alaska to monitor snow load on roofs after a powerful storm moved through the region, coating buildings with snow and ice. The storm began Christmas Eve and the area is expecting more snow this week.

“There was anywhere between 8 to 12 inches of snow around town with some higher amounts parts of the hills around Fairbanks, and that was through early Sunday morning when the snow changed over to primarily rain,” National Weather Service meteorologist Alex Young told KUAC over the weekend.

The rain led to ice accumulation. Golden Valley Electric Association reported thousands of customers were without power. Fairbanks police said there were numerous traffic accidents.

The weekend storm deposited 9.3 inches of snow in Fairbanks. Snow began again on Tuesday, with an expected accumulation of between 6 and 12 inches, according to the National Weather Service. Surrounding areas were also expecting more snow. The Weather Service encouraged residents to consider taking measures to reduce snow load on structures.

“It is definitely for residents to start paying attention to how much snow they have on their structures. And especially this time of the winter, as we start getting more and more snow building up,” said National Weather Service Meteorologist Ed Plumb. Additional buildup will continue through Wednesday, he said.

“Around the Fairbanks area, we could see another 8 to 10 inches of snow, from Fairbanks and out toward Chena Hot Springs Road,” he said Monday.

The roof of the IGA grocery store in Delta Junction collapsed on Sunday. Store owner Ed Larson posted a message on Facebook stating the store will be temporarily closed until he can deal with insurance issues and then get the roof fixed. The cave-in didn’t affect the liquor store, nor a restaurant and a Wells Fargo branch office next door.

Plumb said the Delta Junction area has gotten a lot more snow earlier this season than Fairbanks. And he said that may be why the weight of the snow that’s fallen in one area around Delta comes to about 31 pounds per square foot.

No one was hurt in the IGA cave-in nor in another that happened about eight hours later at a nearby gas station and convenience store. But that’s about all that Buffalo Center Service co-owner Eileen Herman could say about it Sunday evening.

Herman said the snow load on a roof is important information that Alaskans need to pay attention to. Especially those who live in small towns that may have to suffer days, maybe weeks of going without a grocery store.

“It’s kind of a blow to the whole community with IGA, and now us,” she said.