ALEUTIANS EAST BOROUGH

Mount Shishaldin is simmering down after a Friday eruption sent an ash cloud across the eastern Aleutians, prompting the Alaska Volcano Observatory to raise the aviation color code to red.

King Cove often makes headlines for its long-fought battle over a proposed road that would connect it to the all-weather airport in Cold Bay. The remote Aleutian community says the road is key to saving lives because medevacs have a hard time landing on the small, gravel airstrip. With such limited healthcare, it’s a big deal when the community gets new medical equipment. And when they get something big, like the new ambulance that arrived in August, that can be cause for celebration.

Communities in the Aleutians East Borough are bracing for a revenue hit, as the region’s largest seafood processor builds a new facility outside of the borough.

The telecommunications company said in a statement that Sand Point, King Cove and Akutan are hooked up to their fiber optic cable, hailing it a “major milestone” in closing the digital divide between urban and rural communities.

During the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association's candlelight vigil in Anchorage last October, purple ribbons and candles were passed around to remember Unangax̂ victims of crime and to bring awareness to the missing and murdered victims.

The Alaska State Troopers arrested Christopher Mitchell, a 36-year-old Washington resident, for an outstanding warrant as he was traveling to Sand Point, at which time they say they found nearly $100,000 worth of fentanyl and methamphetamine.

Western Alaska chum versus Eastern Aleutian sockeye: that’s how many people are framing an Alaska Senate bill that aims to temporarily close Area M, a fishery off the Alaska Peninsula and eastern Aleutian Islands.

About a year ago, the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation tested Cold Bay’s water wells for PFAS, and the results came back well above the levels recommended for human consumption. Cold Bay closed the wells for drinking when the test results came back, and the Eastern Aleutian community has relied on state-provided bottled water ever since.

One proposal aimed to limit the amount of chum caught in Area M’s South Peninsula fishery to allow more chum to return to Western Alaska rivers. The board ended up passing some restrictions, but it’s far short of what Western Alaska residents were hoping for. And communities near the Area M fishery say they aren’t satisfied either.

A federal appeals court last week reversed a decision that had impeded construction of a road through the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge. The proposed road would stretch 11 miles through the wildlife refuge on the Alaska Peninsula, connecting the communities of King Cove and Cold Bay. The project has been held up in the courts since 2020, when a judge blocked a land exchange necessary for the road’s construction. But the court decided last Wednesday to reverse that judge’s decision that prevented the swap between King Cove’s Native corporation and the federal government. Supporters of the road say it will save lives. The small airport in King Cove is closed due to weather around 100 days a year, on average. Advocates say connecting King Cove to the much larger airport in Cold Bay would make emergency medical care more accessible for residents of the small community in the Aleutians East Borough.