Update, 4:30 p.m.:
Three people have died and six more are injured after a passenger van rolled-over in Atka Tuesday night.
According to the Associated Press the deceased were all from Anchorage. 43-year-old Ray McCullough Jr., 51-year-old Mike TunohunJr. and 57-year-old Paul Nicholas Nesbit died in single-vehicle crash.
Alaska State Troopers say they learned of the single vehicle crash just after 6 p.m.
The people involved in the accident are employees of Atka Pride Seafoods which is a subsidiary of the Aleutian Pribilof Island Community Development Association (APICDA). In a press release, APICDA’s EllenKrsnaksays the accident occurred when they were traveling from the processing plant to the bunkhouse for dinner. The Coast Guard has transported several of the injured parties to Anchorage.
Megan Peters is the public information officer for the Alaska State Troopers. She says Troopers will be in the village today to investigate.
“When we do have our guys flying out to remote locations a lot of times cell phone service is bad or they don’t have a radio signal there, so while our troopers are there and learning stuff and they’re able to confirm things on scene it makes it difficult to relay information to a lot of people quickly,” Peters said.
She says she does not want to tie up the lines when the troopers are trying to deal with the actual incident.
In addition to the troopers, members of the Aleutian Pribilof Island Association's (APIA) behavioral health team are headed to Atka today to provide grief counseling services to the community and employees of Atka Pride Seafood. They will be in Atka until June 22nd. Counseling is also available for the injured being treated in Anchorage and families of the deceased.
Names of the injured and deceased are being held until families can be notified.
This is a developing story; check back for updates.
Correction: this story misstated that the behavioral health team is a part of APICDA. In fact, the team is a part of APIA, an organization that specializes in meeting the health safety and well-being needs of Unangan communities.
