Southcentral

A draft of the 20-year plan for Alaska’s state ferry system is open for public comment. Officials with the Alaska Department of Transportation are asking residents to weigh in on the plan that will guide the Alaska Marine Highway System through the year 2045.

The long-range plan seeks to increase service to over 30 ports. In recent years, port calls have decreased and coastal communities have repeatedly voiced their concern.

In an online public meeting March 19, AMHS Director Craig Tornga said the system is planning for more reliable service – not increasing it much but bringing it back to pre-pandemic levels.

“We’re really looking at trying to increase the port calls at our current communities and to make sure that we have some reliable service on a regular basis that can be planned,” said Tornga. “And then keeping it as efficient as we can from a cost perspective for the state, so it can be maintainable going forward.”

The state plans to build new hybrid ferries to replace the aging fleet, hire more workers to run them, and improve infrastructure at the ports.

That, plus regular maintenance, will cost about $3 billion. The plan to pay for it includes a combination of state and federal money along with increasing profits from ridership.

In creating the plan, the state hired engineering and research groups to crunch data and gather information from dozens of coastal communities. Economist Katie Berry said the ferry plan anticipates the state to appropriate roughly $120 million a year in operating costs. The 20-year plan also calculates that federal funding remains intact.

“The expectation is that the federal funding sources that have pre-dated the Federal Infrastructure Act will be stable over this time period,” Berry said.

The Infrastructure Law brought in about $700 million in federal funds to the ferry system in the last three years. Meanwhile, Gov. Mike Dunleavy has vetoed millions in state ferry funding that the Alaska Legislature approved.

Efforts for a long-range plan began in 2022 after the Legislature created the Alaska Marine Highway Operations Board to help guide the state’s DOT. The nine-member board is made up of state workers and coastal residents with ferry knowledge.

The public comment period on the long-range plan ends March 30. The operations board will consider the plan in April before it heads to the Legislature. According to state law, the plan will be updated every five years.

Three people were rescued Monday morning after their small plane fell through the ice on Sunday near the east side of Tustumena Lake, on the Kenai Peninsula.

The Alaska Army National Guard rescued an adult pilot and two passengers, both minors, from a Piper Super Cruiser at about 10:30 a.m., according to an online dispatch from the Alaska State Troopers.

All three passengers were taken to Central Peninsula Hospital for non-life-threatening injuries. The hospital did not disclose the current status of the patients.

The non-commercial flight originated from the Soldotna airport. The plane was reported missing on Sunday night, about 12 hours before it was found partially submerged under ice.

A U.S Coast Guard air crew searched the area early in the morning, but the plane was found later by a good Samaritan aircraft.

The three passengers of the plane waited on the wings until help arrived.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

The likelihood of an Alaska volcano’s explosive eruption not far from the state’s largest city has increased, according to researchers.

Officials with the Alaska Volcano Observatory reported Wednesday morning that flights over the volcano on Friday and Tuesday detected increased gas emissions from Mount Spurr, about 80 miles west of Anchorage and the closest active volcano to Alaska’s population centers. The gas emissions show that new magma has formed under the volcano, which “indicates that an eruption is likely, but not certain, to occur within the next few weeks or months,” the researchers’ update says.

That follows months of unrest, during which the researchers detected an increase in the number of small earthquakes at Mount Spurr, starting in the spring of 2024. That caused the Alaska Volcano Observatory to raise its code for Spurr to yellow, or “advisory” status, in October. In February, researchers said the earthquakes and deformation of the volcano continued, but they said at the time there were equal chances the volcano would erupt or not.

Mount Spurr remained in advisory status Wednesday, but the researchers now predict the most likely outcome of the unrest at the volcano is “one or more explosive events” that could last as long as a few hours and produce ash clouds carried for hundreds of miles.

“More often than not, we have explosive eruptions that fragment magma and shoot ash, you know, 50,000 feet into the atmosphere,” said Matt Haney, who’s in charge of the Alaska Volcano Observatory.

Similar eruptions occurred in 1953 and 1992, when roughly a quarter of an inch of ash fell on Southcentral communities. The 1992 eruption resulted in the Anchorage airport closing for 20 hours.

A checklist of signs

Scientists like Haney have had their eyes on Mount Spurr for months.

“It started almost a year ago, with increased amounts of earthquakes beneath a volcano, and we’ve been tracking that closely,” he said.

Then came the increase in gases, the melting of snow and the inflating surface.

“It’s almost like we have a checklist of the usual signs that volcanoes give us before they progress to an eruption,” he said. “And now we’re seeing all four of those are giving us those indicators.”

Haney said the most likely scenario is an eruption not from the summit of Mount Spurr, but at an opening about 2 miles away called Crater Peak.

“The eruptions of Mount Spurr in 1953 and in 1992 were from Crater Peak,” Haney said. “And when they flew around Crater Peak, they did not measure sulfur dioxide gas in excessive background there, but they did measure carbon dioxide, which is indicative of magma intruding beneath Mount Spurr in Crater Peak in particular.”

Ash could pose hazards

Haney said the explosive eruption that researchers are now predicting could last for as long as a few hours and produce ash clouds carried for hundreds of miles.

That ash is known to shut down jet engines and cause severe damage to plane exteriors, and Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport is one of the busiest air cargo hubs in the world. In December 1989, a KLM 747 jet flew through ash from another nearby volcano, Mount Redoubt, and the plane’s engines shut down, forcing an emergency landing in Anchorage with 231 passengers aboard.

On the ground, the most immediate hazard to nearby residents from a Mount Spurr eruption would be from ashfall, which could be carried by winds, State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management spokesman Jeremy Zidek said.

“Ash is not good for people to breathe,” Zidek said. “It’s not good for your skin. So what we want people to do during the volcanic eruption is really minimize their exposure to that ash as much as possible. Mask up if they do have to go outside.”

The ash can also impact visibility on the roads and damage vehicles, so residents should limit their driving in the event of an eruption, Zidek said.

Eruption could occur with ‘little or no additional warning’

Haney, the volcano researcher, said an eruption could come with “little or no additional warning” and pose a risk to people closer to the volcano, within about 15 or 20 miles.

“There would be more proximal hazards, like hot flows of ash and gas called pyroclastic flows that would go down the slopes of the volcano,” Haney said. “There can also be volcanic mudflows called lahars.”

Though the eruption has the potential to temporarily impact air travel, Zidek said he doesn’t anticipate widespread impacts.

“While we need to be mindful of it and take steps to prevent breathing it, we don’t anticipate we’re going to see widespread power outages (or) our water supplies being contaminated,” Zidek said. “We don’t anticipate that air travel will be canceled for weeks.”

So, while Mount Spurr’s unrest comes with some risks, Haney said there should be ways for residents to see the eruption from a safe distance at Anchorage’s Point Woronzof.

“When it comes into Anchorage, it will be almost like a sandstorm with dark ash,” Haney said. “It will, if it occurs in daylight, it’ll block out the sun.”

If it comes at night, Haney said onlookers can be in for a different visual spectacle

“It can produce a large amount of lightning,” Haney said. “We call it volcanic lightning. It’s due to charges getting set up by the the ash particles scraping up next to each other.”

More information on how residents can prepare for an eruption is available on the state emergency division website.

This story has been updated. 

Alaska State Troopers have named the three heli-skiers killed in Tuesday’s massive avalanche near Girdwood, with recovery efforts still pending due to dangerous conditions in the area.

In an updated report Thursday morning, troopers said David Linder and Charles Eppard, both 39, and Jeremy Leif, 38, were killed in the slide near the west fork of Twentymile River. The men were from Florida, Montana and Minnesota, respectively.

They were on a backcountry ski trip with friends, Minnesota Public Radio reported, with a fundraising page describing it as a trip of a lifetime in Alaska. The men were skiing with Girdwood-based Chugach Powder Guides.

Minnesota ties

Linder most recently lived in Miami but was born and raised in Mankato, Minn., according to the Minnesota Star Tribune. He co-owned several radio stations across Minnesota and leaves behind a wife and three young sons. His managing partner at Radio Mankato, Matt Ketelsen, described Linder as an experienced skier and devoted father.

“Whenever we would talk on the phone, we would just talk about each other’s kids,” he told the Minnesota newspaper. “First and foremost he was about his kids.”

The Star Tribune said the other two skiers also had ties to the state: Leif was a Minneapolis resident and Eppard had attended a college in St. Peter.

Eppard is survived by his wife and their daughter. A fundraising page set up for his family describes him as “a loving father, devoted husband, incredibly thoughtful and hardworking employee and an overall amazing human being.”

The three skiers were buried in a huge avalanche Tuesday afternoon in an area that’s only reachable by air, just northeast of Girdwood. Troopers said guides with the heli-ski company attempted to rescue the men but they were buried between 40 and 100 feet deep.

A fourth skier who was in the group and not caught in the avalanche was safely rescued, according to a lawyer representing the heli-ski company.

The lawyer could not be reached Thursday and an employee who answered the phone at the company declined to comment.

Initial efforts to revisit the avalanche site Wednesday were prevented by poor weather. Troopers said they, along with avalanche and recovery experts, were again attempting Thursday to conduct an aerial assessment of the slide.

Dangerous conditions continue

Meanwhile, avalanche danger persists.

The Chugach National Forest Avalanche Information Center’s Thursday forecast for the area indicated very dangerous avalanche conditions at elevations above 1,000 feet. Additional snowfall Wednesday had overloaded a weak layer of snow, creating the possibility of both natural and human-triggered avalanches.

“Travel in avalanche terrain is not recommended,” forecasters wrote.

Andrew Schauer, a forecaster at the center, said Thursday morning that the situation posed the threat of sudden avalanches at any time.

“We are concerned with those dangerous conditions, since it won’t be immediately apparent to people out there for the recovery or people in the area,” he said.

Alaska State Troopers say three heli-skiers are presumed dead after they were caught in a massive avalanche Tuesday near Girdwood.

Troopers said in an online dispatch that the avalanche caught the skiers at about 3:30 p.m. near the west fork of the Twentymile River, about 8 miles northeast of the Girdwood airport in an area only accessible by air. Guides from the heli-skiing company they were flying with immediately tried to locate them.

“Using avalanche beacons, the guides identified a probable area where skiers were buried between 40 feet and nearly 100 feet deep,” troopers said.

Troopers spokesman Austin McDaniel said the heli-skiing flight was operated by Girdwood-based Chugach Powder Guides. A person who answered the company’s phone Wednesday declined to comment. A Homer lawyer specializing in recreation and adventure law, who told the Anchorage Daily News she was acting as a spokesperson for the heli-skiing company, refused to comment to Alaska Public Media.

Troopers have not yet released the skiers’ names.

McDaniel said in a text message Wednesday morning that none of the skiers are thought to have lived.

“Based on the information provided by the operator, unfortunately, we do not believe that any of the three missing persons survived the avalanche,” he said.

No other recovery efforts were made Tuesday due to avalanche risk and limited daylight, troopers said. The scene will be assessed Wednesday to determine whether further work to recover the skiers can be safely conducted.

Tracey Knutson, the lawyer acting as a spokesperson for Chugach Powder Guides, gave the Anchorage Daily News a detailed account of what happened in the slide, from the heli-ski company’s point of view.

Knutson told the ADN that the skiers were on a regular run for the company and that witnesses saw all three skiers activate avalanche airbags when the slide started, at an elevation of about 3,500 feet. One person who was in the group and not caught in the avalanche was safely rescued, Knutson told the ADN.

Three guides reached the debris, which had slid about 2,800 feet, and detected three signals from beacons the buried skiers wore, Knutson told the ADN.

The Chugach National Forest Avalanche Information Center reported considerable avalanche danger in the area Tuesday at elevations above 1,000 feet. Its forecast noted the possibility of human-triggered avalanches, with up to 2 feet of wind-blown snow atop a frost layer. The forecast advised avoiding steep slopes.

Knutson refused to answer any questions from Alaska Public Media, including about what safety measures the guides took, how they decided to take clients skiing with “considerable” avalanche danger in the area or what decisions led to three skiers, an uncommonly high number, getting caught and buried. She said such questions were inappropriate as the recovery effort was still under way.

According to the Alaska Avalanche Information Center, the state’s last avalanche that killed three people occurred on Bear Mountain near Chugiak in February of 2021. Troopers said at the time that three climbers ascending a technical route of the mountain were found dead, beneath what appeared to be a recent avalanche.

In its Wednesday forecast, Chugach National Forest avalanche forecasters said the Twentymile River slide was accompanied by other human-triggered avalanches Tuesday. Staff offered their condolences to friends and family, urging people to “avoid traveling on or below steep or consequential terrain” due to dangerous avalanche conditions.

Calls to the forecasters went unreturned Wednesday morning.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

University of Alaska Anchorage Chancellor Sean Parnell has announced that he will retire at the end of the spring semester.

In a message to the UAA community, Parnell said the university was well suited for the future.

“It has been an honor to serve at UAA, where we create opportunities for others through our collective work,” he said.

Parnell, 62, said he was retiring to spend more time with his family and friends, and to research, write and continue mentoring.

Parnell was appointed as UAA chancellor in 2021 by UA President Pat Pitney. Before that, he had a long political career, serving as governor from 2009 to 2014 after stints as lieutenant governor and as a state legislator.

In a statement, Pitney described Parnell as an incredible leader, and touted his experience in growing enrollment and building relationships with community partners.

““He joined our system during a challenging time, and has been a dedicated chancellor since Day 1, revitalizing connections with the Anchorage and the UAA Community,” Pitney said.

She said the university will navigate finding Parnell’s replacement in the coming months.