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Smoke column from the Lost Horse Creek Fire on Aug. 3, 2023. (Togie Wiehl/Alaska Interagency Management Team) Stories are posted on the statewide news page. Send news tips, questions, and comments to news@alaskapublic.org. Follow Alaska Public Media on Facebook and on Twitter @AKPublicNews. And subscribe to the Alaska News Nightly podcast. Friday on Alaska News Nightly: Crews attack at least…

Surfers wade into the shallow water of Turnagain Arm on Monday. (Dev Hardikar/Alaska Public Media) Twice a day, the normally calm waters of the Turnagain Arm surge upwards, creating a wave known as a tidal bore, a rare tidal phenomenon that surfers like Pete Beachy can ride for a very long time.  “We’re pretty lucky…

A sign directs visitors to either the Nesbett Courthouse or Boney Courthouse in downtown Anchorage. (Valerie Kern/ Alaska Public Media) An Anchorage man is accused of fraudulently collecting nearly $800,000 in Medicaid payments over the past two years, state officials said Thursday. According to a statement from the Alaska Department of Law, a grand jury…

Anchorage School District Superintendent Jharrett Bryantt stands in front of a school bus at the ASD Transportation Center at the intersection of Tudor Road and Elmore Road on Aug. 2, 2023. (Tim Rockey/Alaska Public Media) Stories are posted on the statewide news page. Send news tips, questions, and comments to news@alaskapublic.org. Follow Alaska Public Media on Facebook and on Twitter…

The Basher Drive trailhead in Anchorage on Thursday. (Shiri Segal/Alaska Public Media) A man accused of assaulting and threatening people last week on Anchorage trails is back behind bars Thursday, after he allegedly assaulted another group of hikers upon his release on initial charges. Police said in a statement last week that Sean Ahmed, 38,…

James Phelps, a prior U.S. Air Force technical sergeant who has four Afghanistan deployments, sits in his wheelchair surrounded by wounded warrior sports memorabilia at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, May, 2023. (Justin Connaher/Courtesy of JBER) Veteran James Phelps was at a fireworks celebration with his wife and infant daughter eight years ago, and he thought…

Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson outside Alaska Public Media. August 1, 2023. (Matt Faubion/Alaska Public Media) Stories are posted on the statewide news page. Send news tips, questions, and comments to news@alaskapublic.org. Follow Alaska Public Media on Facebook and on Twitter @AKPublicNews. And subscribe to the Alaska News Nightly podcast. Wednesday on Alaska News Nightly: Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson discusses his…

Federal Correctional Institution, Dublin is a low-security prison in Dublin, California. (Federal Bureau of Prisons) An Alaska woman is suing the federal government over sexual abuse she says she suffered at the hands of the warden and staff at a California prison that came to be known as a “rape club.” According to the lawsuit,…

Old Crow Medicine Show is playing Salmonfest Saturday, August 5. (Joshua Black Wilkins) Ketch Secor first visited Alaska when he was 14 and it made a lasting impression on him. He traveled the Alaska Railroad, bought chewing tobacco in Sitka and kissed a girl in Fairbanks. The singer and fiddle player for the long-running, high-energy…

Bear 480, Otis, matched his latest appearance to the falls yet. The last time he appeared on cameras this late was also on July 26, back in 2021. Photo from July 2023. (F. Jimenez/National Park Service) Stories are posted on the statewide news page. Send news tips, questions, and comments to news@alaskapublic.org. Follow Alaska Public Media on Facebook and…

Kake resident Frank Hughes holds up a cedar rose he crafted. He’s found making the roses relieves him temporarily of his persistent tinnitus. (Lorenda Johnson/Alaska Public Media) Cedar bark roses are a traditional First-Nations craft in the Pacific Northwest, including for Lingít people. Soaked strips of cedar bark are folded into golden roses which dry…

Supporters of former President Trump gather outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, before rioters stormed the building. (Liz Ruskin/Alaska Public Media) Hours after former President Donald Trump was charged Tuesday with crimes related to the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the evidence is strong that he helped launch…

The sample collection tools inside a SART kit, which is used for sexual assault investigations. (Anne Hillman/Alaska Public Media) Stories are posted on the statewide news page. Send news tips, questions, and comments to news@alaskapublic.org. Follow Alaska Public Media on Facebook and on Twitter @AKPublicNews. And subscribe to the Alaska News Nightly podcast. Monday on Alaska News Nightly: A new…

Shawn Steik in downtown Anchorage. Steik said he and his wife would likely fly to Seattle if Mayor Dave Bronson’s plan announced last week goes forward to buy homeless people plane tickets out of the state. (Mark Thiessen/AP) Shawn Steik and his wife were forced from a long-term motel room onto the streets of Anchorage…

Well number 2 — where the PFAS were found — is located in Unalaska’s Valley, across from the Qawalangin Tribe office. Tompkins said the history of military presence in the area may be the cause of the contamination. (Hope McKenney/KUCB) According to a recent report from Unalaska’s Department of Public Utilities, some of the island’s drinking water…

Cars line the parking lot of NAPA Auto Parts for Bethel’s first car show. (Josiah Swope/KYUK) Gary Baldwin prefers to find parts for his teal 1953 Willys Jeep pickup truck rather than buying them. It shows when he pops the hood. “There’s a lot of parts from different vehicles from the dump in here,” Baldwin…

Trident Seafoods is constructing a state-of-the-art facility to process fish in Unalaska. Representatives say they expect to be online in 2027. (Hope McKenny/KUCB) Trident Seafoods has begun building the first bunkhouses at its to-be processing plant in Unalaska’s Captains Bay, progressing on a timeline the seafood titan says would make it operational by 2027. The…

Dana Bloch pictured with a bottle of whale feces collected for her research. (Courtesy Dana Bloch) Humpback whales could be growing their own food supply and fighting climate change in a very unusual way — with their poo. Biologists are conducting Alaska research this summer on what’s called the “whale pump hypothesis.” The first time…

Hospitalizations for COVID-19 are ticking up. But even if illnesses keep rising, it appears unlikely that they will hit previous summer peaks. (EMS-Forster-Productions/Getty Images) Yet another summer COVID-19 wave may have started in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “After roughly six, seven months of steady declines, things are starting…

Residents in line for tickets at Bethel’s first screening of “Barbie.” (Sunni Bean/KYUK) Western Alaska was no exception to last weekend’s “Barbenheimer” wave of Hollywood buzz, linking an unlikely movie duo in what became Hollywood’s hottest box-office weekend since before the pandemic. The films at its core could hardly be more different: a reimagining of…

President Biden heads to the Marine One helicopter on the South Lawn of the White House on Friday, July 28, 2023. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images) President Biden signed an executive order Friday implementing sweeping changes to the military justice system’s handling of sexual assault cases. The reforms, which won bipartisan approval in Congress, remove…

Camps are erected on both sides of Karluk Street near the Brother Francis Shelter on Thursday, July 27, 2023 in downtown Anchorage. (Loren Holmes/ADN) Twenty-nine people believed to be homeless have died outside in Anchorage so far in 2023, far surpassing last year’s grim record — with five months left to go in the year.…