Adzing work continues on the finals beams meant for the ongoing construction of the Chief Shakes Tribal House in Wrangell.
You can hear the sound of a blade meeting wood coming from a large shed in downtown Wrangell. Two women are busy working on long, rectangular beams of red cedar with adzes, which is an axlike tool that’s shaped a bit like a curved “L”. Susie Kasinger and Linda Churchill have been adzing since last year for the ongoing construction.
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The final day of Southeast Conference presentations ended Wednesday with a focus on what is not only a regional, but a statewide concern: energy. More specifically, how to get more power at a reasonable cost.
Alaska Energy Authority Executive Director Sarah Fisher-Goad talked Wednesday about energy development projects. She said her office recently received 20 applications from Southeast for renewable energy fund program grants for power projects.
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The search has been suspended for two boaters reported overdue in Norton Sound.
The Coast Guard and Alaska State Troopers were involved in the aerial search for 41-year-old David Slwooko and 48-year-old Debra Kimoktoak.
Troopers say the Unalakleet couple was to travel Monday from Koyuk to Unalakleet in a 17-foot boat, but never arrived in Unalakleet that evening as expected. Troopers say the pair had two dogs with them and enough food to last at least a day.
Troopers launched a search after the two were reported overdue Tuesday, but they say extremely low water and high winds hampered the search. The search continued yesterday with C-130 aircraft, H-60 helicopter, and the cutter Bertholf.
After seven different searches, the Coast Guard says the effort was suspended last night before 10 o’clock.
The Coast Guard says the skiff was found yesterday south of Egg Island, about 30 miles southwest of Unalakleet. It was beached and overturned, but no sign of the couple or the two dogs with them.
View Norton Sound boaters missing in a larger map
Sealaska Heritage Institute has received a total of $4.5 million for educational programs and the Walter Soboleff Center to be built in downtown Juneau.
The federally funded Alaska Native Education Program has awarded three grants; the first for about $2 million over two years, dedicated to construction of the Soboleff facility.
The second grant is $1.2 million over three years for cultural orientation programs for teachers in the Juneau School District and University of Alaska Southeast.
The heritage institute has already signed an agreement with the school district and UAS for educational programs. SHI president Rosita Worl says the program for teachers’ began informally this fall.
“It (the grant) will also allow us to develop culturally relevant resources,” Worl says. “We know that teachers are extraordinarily busy and we know they have definite requirements they have to teach to, so providing supplemental materials that speak to our culture, I think, will also help them.”
A third grant over three years is for $1.37 million for math summer camps for Southeast Alaska middle school students. Worl calls the proposed classes math “boot camp.”
“We have partnered with the University of Alaska in the teacher-training program and we see where our students are coming into the university not prepared in math — in general. I mean we do have students who are doing well in math, but in general,” she says. “So we decided that we were going to go after programs where we could help our students in math.”
Such programs will be part of the Walter Soboleff Center when it is completed. It will have classrooms and event spaces as well as ethnographic collections and a research facility. Worl says about half the funds have been raised for the center, estimated at $20 million.
Alaska Native organizations, school districts and universities are eligible to compete for funds from the Alaska Native Education Program. It was created by the late U.S. Senator Ted Stevens for Alaska Native education programs, because Alaska does not have benefit of educational funding through Bureau of Indian Affairs schools, unlike other states.
Coast Guard aircraft crews are looking for a missing skiff in Northwest Alaska with two people and two dogs onboard. The 17-foot skiff was heading from Koyuk to Unalakleet when it disappeared earlier this week.
Lieutenant Crystal Hudak of the Coast Guard command center in Juneau said Thursday morning that were dispatching an H-60 helicopter from their Forward Operating Location, or new summertime base, in Barrow to look for the skiff. A C-130 aircraft, already positioned in Anchorage, was also being dispatched to help search for the skiff.
Another C-130 aircraft is being sent from Kodiak to meet up with the H-60 in Kotzebue. They’ll transport a second helicopter crew which will relieve the first crew for the search.
The cutter Bertholf is also being diverted to help search.
Two cruise ships sailing Alaska waters have battled recent norovirus outbreaks. The highly-contagious illness causes vomiting, diarrhea and fevers, and can lead to dehydration.
The latest outbreak is on the Dawn Princess, which is wrapping up a three-week cruise including stops in Southeast and Southcentral Alaska.
The federal Centers for Disease Control reports 6.5 percent of its nearly 1,800 passengers suffered from norovirus at the same time during part of the cruise.
CDC staff boarded the Dawn Princess in Juneau on Friday to evaluate the outbreak. Staff also looked at crew members’ efforts to disinfect the ship to prevent further cases.
The CDC’s Jay Dempsey says the situation has improved.
“They are reporting a less than 2 percent number of passenger and crewmembers at this time. So it does seem to be that that outbreak was contained and they are sailing at a normal rate now,” Dempsey says.
The ship is due into San Francisco on Thursday (September 13th).
The earlier outbreak was on board Royal Caribbean Cruise Line’s Rhapsody of the Seas. Norovirus struck more than 7 percent of passengers during a late-August Inside Passage cruise.
The CDC’s Canadian counterpart sent inspectors to a port call in British Columbia and deemed the outbreak under control.
Dempsey says the illness is easily spread through contact with handrails, restroom fixtures, door handles and similar surfaces.
“It’s just like any other time that you have a lot of people sharing the same space. You just have a greater chance a norovirus-like illness might outbreak amongst that group of people. And it’s the same on land, whether you have people living in a nursing home or a dormitory or similar situation,” Dempsey says.
The Dawn Princess and the Rhapsody of the Seas are the only two Alaska cruise ships reporting outbreaks this season. That’s better than last year, when four ships reported high norovirus numbers, one on several cruises.
