JUNEAU, Alaska – On Wednesday, the Alaskan coast braced for more rain and wind following the destruction caused in small villages by the remnants of Typhoon Halong. Authorities rushed to provide shelter for over 1,500 residents displaced by the storm.
The storm over the weekend wreaked havoc with strong winds and surf that severely affected the low-lying Alaska Native villages on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, located in the southwestern part of Alaska, nearly 500 miles (800 km) from Anchorage. The storm resulted in at least one fatality and two missing individuals. The Coast Guard rescued two dozen people when their homes were swept into the sea.
Many found temporary refuge in school shelters, with some lacking basic amenities like functioning toilets, as stated by officials. This weather event came on the heels of another storm that recently affected parts of western Alaska.
Throughout the region, over 1,500 individuals were forced to leave their homes. Dozens were airlifted to a shelter established at the National Guard armory in Bethel, a town with 6,000 residents. Authorities are considering relocating evacuees to more stable shelters or emergency housing in Fairbanks and Anchorage.
The villages suffering the most included Kipnuk, with a population of 715, and Kwigillingok, home to 380 people. These areas are not connected to the state’s primary road system and are accessible this time of year only by water or air.
“The situation in Kipnuk is dire. We shouldn’t downplay the seriousness,” stated Mark Roberts, the incident commander with the state emergency management division, during a Tuesday press conference. “We are doing everything possible to support the community, but the situation is as severe as imagined.”
Heartbreaking moment
Among those awaiting evacuation to Bethel on Tuesday was Brea Paul, of Kipnuk, who said in a text message that she had seen about 20 homes floating away through the moonlight on Saturday night.
“Some houses would blink their phone lights at us like they were asking for help but we couldn’t even do anything,” she wrote.
The following morning, she recorded video of a house submerged nearly to its roofline as it floated past her home.
Paul and her neighbors had a long meeting in the local school gym on Monday night. They sang songs as they tried to figure out what to do next, she said. Paul wasn’t sure where she would go.
“It’s so heartbreaking saying goodbye to our community members not knowing when we’d get to see each other,” she said.
About 30 miles (48 kilometers) away in Kwigillingok, one woman was found dead and authorities on Monday night called off the search for two men whose home floated away.
The school was the only facility in town with full power, but it had no working toilet and 400 people stayed there Monday night. Workers were trying to fix the bathrooms; a situation report from the state emergency operations center on Tuesday noted that portable toilets, or “honey buckets,” were being used.
A preliminary assessment showed every home in the village was damaged by the storm, with about three dozen having drifted from their foundations, the emergency management office said.
Power systems flooded in Napakiak, and severe erosion was reported in Toksook Bay. In Nightmute, officials said fuel drums were reported floating in the community, and there was a scent of fuel in the air and a sheen on the water.
The National Guard was activated to help with the emergency response, and crews were trying to take advantage of any breaks in the weather to fly in food, water, generators and communication equipment.
Long road to recovery ahead, officials say
Officials warned of a long road to recovery and a need for continued support for the hardest-hit communities. Most rebuilding supplies would have to be transported in and there is little time left with winter just around the corner.
“Indigenous communities in Alaska are resilient,” said Rick Thoman, an Alaska climate specialist at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. “But, you know, when you have an entire community where effectively every house is damaged and many of them will be uninhabitable with winter knocking at the door now, there’s only so much that any individual or any small community can do.”
Thoman said the storm was likely fueled by the warm surface waters of the Pacific Ocean, which has been heating up because of human-caused climate change and making storms more intense.
The remnants of another storm, Typhoon Merbok, caused damage across a massive swath of western Alaska three years ago.
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Johnson and Attanasio reported from Seattle.
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