Western Alaska reels as storm aftermath prompts mass evacuations

Historic storms that lashed Alaska’s Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta earlier this month have left behind devastation across the southwestern part of the state, prompting mass evacuations from the remote region. At least one death has been directly attributed to the remnants of Typhoon Halong, with more than 1,500 people displaced by destruction from hurricane-force winds and high surf. Indigenous coastal communities are particularly affected, prompting a race for relief efforts as winter prepares to set in.

‘Absolute devastation’

Within the “remote” area affected by the weekend’s storm, the “hardest-hit communities” are Kipnuk and Kwigillingok, where high winds and rain “damaged every single home,” including pulling off some of their foundations, The Guardian said. “It’s catastrophic in Kipnuk,” said Mark Roberts, an incident commander with the state emergency management agency. “Let’s not paint any other picture.” In the days immediately following the storm, hundreds of residents of both villages were left sleeping in local schools, some “without functioning toilets” and others in areas “where the water plant wasn’t working and electricity was limited,” Alaska Public Radio said.

“The folks that were in houses that were floating and didn’t know where they were was one of the most tragic things our folks in the state [Emergency Operations Center] have ever faced,” Roberts said at a press conference on Monday.

The “remoteness and the scale of the destruction” along the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta has “created challenges for getting resources in place,” said The Associated Press. Rescuers on the ground have begun to switch from “initial search-and-rescue operations” to trying to “stabilize or restore basic services.” Given the sparsity of the affected communities, authorities have also started one of the “most significant airlifts in Alaska history” to evacuate “hundreds” to safety.

‘It becomes this gooey mess’

It’s been “known for years” that Native communities and “Kipnuk in particular” are at “increasing risk for storm surge damage,” Yale Climate Connections said. A 2022 report by the Alaska Institute for Justice indicated that the “frequency and severity” of flooding in the “low-lying region” had increased recently, CBC The report labeled the “relocation of the community” an “urgent need.”

In part, the danger to Kipnuk and other nearby communities comes from rising global temperatures, which have heated the permafrost upon which the village sits. “When you have permafrost it’s like you’re dealing with concrete; you could take an ax to it,” said Tom Ravens, a civil engineering professor at the University of Alaska-Anchorage, to The New York Times. As the frost thaws, however, “it becomes this gooey mess” — one that puts the village’s infrastructure at risk of “collapsing into the river” after any major storm, the Times said.

At a press conference with Gov. Mike Dunleavy and Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, the state’s top lawmakers pledged to “continue to focus on climate resilience and infrastructure funds for Alaska,” CBC said. They also stressed the “congressional delegation’s job to ensure the Trump administration and their colleagues understood the importance of such funds.”