Credit: Craig Hoyt

It’s been a rocky 12 years since Adak was incorporated as a city.

The community has survived power crises, crushing debt, and twice, the closure of its biggest business -- the fish processing plant. Now Adak is facing a new setback.

On Tuesday, the processing plant’s equipment will be auctioned off, and as KUCB’s Stephanie Joyce reports, if it leaves the island, Adak will be left without its economic engine.

In the wake of several high-profile cases of alleged scale-tampering by Bering Sea groundfish vessels, the National Marine Fisheries Service is revising its regulations for weighing fish at-sea. The new measures are aimed at making it more difficult for vessels to underreport their catch.

The Bering Sea’s large catcher-processors weigh their harvest as it heads to the processing line on what’s known as a flow-scale – a section of conveyor belt that takes dozens of measurements per second. When properly calibrated, flow-scales give fisheries managers a very accurate estimate of the amount of fish being harvested. But like all scales, they can be manipulated.

The ongoing eruption at Pavlof Volcano is disrupting regional air travel.

Pavlof stirred back to life Tuesday morning, and has since sent up numerous ash clouds. There’s been no reported ashfall in any nearby communities, and none of the clouds have reached above 19,000 feet, but PenAir cancelled its flights to the Peninsula community of Cold Bay Wednesday because of concerns about drifting ash. On Tuesday, they canceled an afternoon flight to Sand Point.

Federal budget cuts are squeezing Alaska’s culture and science camps. The Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska has traditionally sponsored summer programs within the state’s many refuges, but with sequestration, that funding was eliminated this year, leaving some camps scrambling.

Unalaska’s Camp Qungaayux has relied on the Fish and Wildlife Service’s support for more than a decade. Last year, the federal agency contributed $15,000 outright, and $5,000 in the form of an instructor.

Credit: Ryan Hazen and Brandon Wilson

After a week-long respite, Pavlof Volcano on the Alaska Peninsula has sent up another ash plume. Pilots flying past the volcano Tuesday morning were the first to spot the cloud, which they estimated at 19,000 feet.

PenAir flight operations manager Lloyd Seybert says the airline cancelled its afternoon flight into Sand Point as a result, but the plume hasn’t affected any other PenAir routes.

Alaska Volcano Observatory geologist Michelle Coombs says this pattern of fluctuating activity is pretty standard for Pavlof, but that it can make monitoring difficult.

Former Unalaska Assistant City Manager and current Bristol Bay Borough Manager John Fulton is scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday on charges of driving under the influence, and refusing to submit to a chemical test.

According to charging documents, Fulton was attending the Unalaska High School graduation when he was warned by an off-duty officer that he was too intoxicated to drive. He then allegedly left the celebration and drove to the Grand Aleutian Hotel, where two officers found him unresponsive in his truck, with the keys in the ignition and the engine running. Fulton allegedly failed field sobriety tests, and was transported to the police station.

The future of Adak’s seafood processing plant is up in the air. Following an announcement last month that Icicle Seafoods would permanently shutter its operation in the community, the processing plant’s equipment is being auctioned off, and there’s no guarantee it will stay on the island.

Around this time last year, it looked like Adak’s jet service was in jeopardy. Alaska Airlines wanted to stop flying there, and it was only after much back and forth that they conceded to continue serving the community, on a trial basis.

Now, the uncertainty appears to be over. Alaska Airlines was the only company that responded to a recent request from the federal Department of Transportation for bids on the community’s Essential Air Service contract, and they’ve agreed to commit for two years.

View from Sand Point of Pavlof Volcano Erupting on May 14, 2013 -- Credit: Gina Stafford

Pavlof Volcano put on a light show for residents of several communities on the Alaska Peninsula Tuesday night. Activity at the volcano has increased, and it’s spewing ash up to 20,000 feet.

Cold Bay resident Molly Watson was watching Pavlof for signs of activity from her kitchen window on Tuesday evening.

“And I’d kind of given up, thinking ‘ehn, we’re not going to see anything else, just smoke.’ As soon as I mentally thought that, and I was actually writing it to a friend -- I was emailing -- and sure enough, I saw this spark, and I was like ‘what is that?!’”

Mount Pavlof steaming, with fresh lava flow on its north flank/Credit: Brandon Wilson

Scientists at the Alaska Volcano Observatory were able to get clear views of two restless volcanoes today. The images show that both Cleveland Volcano in the Aleutian Islands and Pavlof Volcano on the Alaska Peninsula are oozing lava.

Cleveland started erupting earlier this month, with six separate explosions sending up multiple ash clouds. The volcano has been quiet since early last week, but the new satellite imagery shows a lava flow coming out of the southeastern side of the crater. The flow is about 100 yards wide, and a mile long.