Kipnuk, in Western Alaska, was heavily damaged by Typhoon Halong and evacuated days later. (Marc Lester / ADN)
Four months after the remnants of a tropical typhoon wrecked communities in Western Alaska, hundreds of people who were displaced are considering abandoning their village altogether.
Tribal members from Kipnuk, a community of about 700 that was among the hardest hit, are now preparing for a possible complete relocation. Working in temporary quarters in downtown Anchorage, tribal workers spent weeks manning phones and computers to try to collect votes about relocation options from all the adults among Kipnuk’s enrolled tribal residents.
The tribal leaders have picked out two potential relocation sites, both at least 40 feet above sea level, and are open to other suggestions. By Friday, they had collected all the votes, and are now tallying the results to determine what the consensus is.
The tribal vote is intended to be a final decision, said Rayna Paul, environmental director for the Native Village of Kipnuk, the tribal government.
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“Oh my gosh, we’re not going back,” Paul said in an interview in her temporary office in Anchorage.
Rayna Paul and other Kipnuk tribal members sit at their temporary Anchorage office on Feb. 11, 2026. On the screen is a map of Kipnuk’s current site and potential relocation sites. From left are Dolan Fox, Darren John, Carrie Dock and Paul. They spent weeks collecting votes from displaced tribal members on the question of relocating versus rebuilding. (Yereth Rosen / Alaska Beacon)
The storms that came with the remnants of Typhoon Halong comprised one of the state’s most devastating natural disasters in recent decades, and it spurred what was the biggest air evacuation in at least half a century, with about 1,600 people moved by military aircraft from the storm-stricken region.
Paul and tribal officials from Kwigillingok, another heavily damaged village, described the ravages during a panel discussion at the Alaska Forum on the Environment earlier this month.
Impacts included houses that were pushed off their foundations and sent afloat; graves washed away; vital stockpiles of fish, berries and other wild foods harvested over the past year were ruined. Halong-related flooding and winds inundated the region with new risks: spilled heating oil, diesel, sewage and other noxious and hazardous substances.
The extent of the damage was shocking, Dustin Evon, Kwigillingok’s tribal resilience coordinator, said at the forum.
“I think we all did not expect the storm to be this catastrophic until houses started floating away and people started calling,” he said.
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The storm’s total toll has yet to be calculated, as assessments could not be completed before winter set in, but Bryan Fisher, director of the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, put the tab at $125 million as of the start of February.
[Many Halong evacuees in Anchorage have relocated to apartments. It’s unclear when they can return home]
Food-security and cultural losses
The damage goes beyond dollars, and they added to damages already underway years before Halong became the latest in a series of powerful recent storms.
Paul said changes have been especially noticeable since ex-Typhoon Merbok hit the same region in 2022. The land and waters around Kipnuk have lost many of the qualities that supported generations of Yup’ik residents.
Blackberries and crowberries have disappeared, possibly because of saltwater inundating the sinking tundra, she said. Blackfish, a freshwater species, are “nowhere to be found,” she said. Tomcod have also been scarce. Other species appear to have suffered, she said; there were reports prior to Halong of several dead white foxes.
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Successive storms have pushed saltwater inland, contaminating drinking water and hastening the permafrost thaw that was already underway beneath the tundra’s surface because of climate change.
If residents decide to leave, the biggest challenge may be securing the money to move the village. There is no single agency in charge of village relocation, a problem cited by organizations like the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium as a hindrance to progress.
However, the concept of moving villages to escape hazards has plenty of historic precedent in Alaska.
Lucy Martin and Dustin Evon of Kwigillingok stand near the stage on Feb. 2, 2026, at the Alaska Forum on the Environment, held in Anchorage. They two were part of a presentation on ex-Typhoon Halong. Behind them are notes taken during the presentation. (Yereth Rosen / Alaska Beacon)
In the most recent case, the village of Newtok, on the fast-eroding banks of the Ninglick River, moved to a more secure inland site called Mertarvik. Conducted amid funding uncertainties and bedeviled by logistical problems, the move took decades.
Historic moves that involve less infrastructure have been simpler.
For example, Chevak, a coastal village about 100 miles north of Kipnuk that also sustained damage from the storm, is itself a relocated site. The current village was established in the mid-20th century, a switch from the site now known as Old Chevak, which was considered to be too prone to floods.
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Kipnuk’s current site is not where the original settlement was located. An earlier site was used at least seasonally before the current site was recognized in 1922 by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, according to Alaska records. The older site had been rejected by the federal government as place for a permanent village because it lacked barge access, Paul said. The government built a school, part of a pattern that tied Indigenous Alaskans who previously moved around by season to permanent communities.
The old Kipnuk site is now one of the two candidate relocation sites that the tribal government has selected for consideration. Both are located at least 40 feet above sea level, Paul said.
There are also cases in Alaska history where the federal government moved fairly quickly to relocate disaster-stricken communities. It took about three years after the Great Alaska Earthquake of 1964 to completely rebuild the city of Valdez in a different and more stable spot.
Rebuilding versus relocating
If Kipnuk residents decide to stay rather than go, a full return to the current village site will require a comprehensive rebuild that would take several years, officials say.
Fisher, of the state Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, broached that subject in the Alaska Forum on the Environment presentation earlier this month.
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Rebuilding would start with new mapping and new data about how far flood waters will spread, he said.
“The land has completely changed from what it looked like before the storm in October,” he said. “So we have to reassess our understanding of what the water can do now that the land is completely different, both under people’s homes or where their homes were, and kind of community-wide,” he said.
Fisher noted that structures raised above the tundra on stilts fared better in the storm, indicating that those features might be incorporated into any new or repaired buildings.
Evon had firsthand experience with the benefit of stilts. While he was helping carry out the emergency response at the Kwigillingok school, one of the few village structures on stilts, his own home floated away.
Sheryl Musgrove, director of the Alaska Climate Justice Program at the Alaska Institute for Justice, is skeptical of that plan.
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If the floodwaters were eight feet deep, that would suggest that buildings need to be 10 feet aboveground, said Musgrove, who is helping Kipnuk’s tribal government and sharing its Anchorage office space for now.
“I don’t know how realistic it is,” she said. Engineers have said the ground has changed and pilings may have to be driven down 100 feet, she added. “Is that realistic, having a 100-foot piling for each home?” she asked.
To Paul, there’s no point in putting that investment in the same place instead of a new and safer spot.
“They’re trying to rebuild when we’re going to be hit by another extreme weather event,” she said. “It doesn’t make sense.”
The expectation of more storms creating this type of damage is justified, according to experts from the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
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Rayna Paul of Kipnuk stands in a meeting room at the Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center in Anchorage on Feb. 2, 2026, after a panel discussion on ex-Typhoon Halong at the Alaska Forum on the Environment. (Yereth Rosen / Alaska Beacon)
Strong fall storms in the Bering Sea, including ex-typhoons, are nothing new, said Rick Thoman, a scientist with UAF’s Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Preparedness.
What is different now is the repeated occurrence of such storms causing severe damage in populated areas of Western Alaska’s mainland, Thoman said in a presentation at the Alaska Forum on the Environment.
Ex-Typhoon Halong was especially unusual in the path that it took: shooting past St. Lawrence Island in the northern Bering Sea to the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, he said.
“This is only the second storm of this intensity to make that, to shoot that gap in the autumn, since 1950,” he said. “That is an extremely rare track for a storm of this intensity in the fall.”
An ex-typhoon is a particular meteorological event, Thoman said. A typhoon is a warm-water storm in a relatively confined geographic space; an ex-typhoon sends winds horizontally over vaster distances, he said. “The area covered by strong winds expands greatly,” he said. And at high latitudes, ex-typhoons become extremely powerful, he said.
Since 1970 more than 60 ex-typhoons have reached Alaska, but more than half of them were limited to the western and central Aleutians, he said. Some reached the Bristol Bay and Alaska Peninsula region, and a few reached the Gulf of Alaska.
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But since the 1970s, there have been only four ex-typhoons that moved into the Arctic after sweeping through the Northern Bering Sea coast: Carlo in 1996, Merbok in 2022, Ampil in 2024 and Halong last October.
Ampil did not produce flooding in Alaska, but it did cause record-high summer winds, Thoman said. And both Merbok and Halong were extremely destructive and expensive disasters fueled by unusually warm waters in the tropical Pacific.
Three powerful ex-typhoon storms hitting Western Alaska’s mainland in the last four years is notable, Thoman said at the forum.
“One, twice, coincidence. Three? OK, now we’ve got an issue, right?” he said at the forum.
For the hundreds of displaced residents like Paul, relocation is a necessity, even if it is just temporary.
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She is getting used to apartment life in a three-story building in East Anchorage, with Chugach Mountain views that are unlike anything on the horizon of the tundra where Kipnuk is situated. She is also trying to adjust to the urban pace of life.
“It’s something different,” she said. “Seems like people don’t sleep.”But she said there have been some positive aspects of the move.
Her nephews are attending Bettye Davis East Anchorage High School and report that even though the school is much bigger than what they are used to — one of the biggest high schools in the state — the environment has been welcoming, Paul said. Some of the evacuated kids are even in a combined Kipnuk-Kwigillingok basketball team, she said.
And Paul is heartened by the sight of ducks flying around Anchorage. “When I see ducks, l’m like, ‘Woo-hoo! Soup,’” she said with a laugh.
She has no idea how long she will be in Anchorage — or even the location of her house, which was one of those in Kipnuk that floated away.
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“I don’t have a house to go back to, you know. So very uncertain,” she said.
Originally published by the Alaska Beacon, an independent, nonpartisan news organization that covers Alaska state government.
The Alaska Senate Finance committee advanced a draft capital budget on Tuesday that would put nearly $250 million toward state facilities and maintenance projects next year.
The draft budget adds $88 million to Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s proposed capital budget of $159 million, with the largest additions going toward K-12 schools and university facilities maintenance.
That was a focused effort by the finance committee, said co-chair Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, who called funding for education facilities maintenance a “heavy concentration” on Wednesday.
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Earlier this year, students and school officials testified to lawmakers that decades of deferred maintenance has reached crisis levels — with many rural school districts in particular grappling with deteriorating facilities, failing water and sewer systems — which they say is degrading student and staff morale. Lawmakers have expressed support and increased funding in recent years, but point to Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s history of vetoes as a roadblock for funding education.
The Senate draft includes $57.8 million in additional funding toward K-12 school maintenance through the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development and $17 million toward the University of Alaska. It also includes $5.7 million for the Alaska Court System’s facilities and $8 million for community infrastructure and workforce development programs through the Alaska Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development.
The Legislature relies on state ranked lists to prioritize where to direct funding to capital projects for K-12 schools, the university system and the court system.
For K-12 schools, the state’s current major maintenance list totals over $400 million needed for 103 school projects and repairs. Stedman said he recognized this year’s capital budget will only fund a fraction of those.
“Hopefully we get a quarter of it done, or something like that, but it’d be nice to retire the entire list,” Stedman said.
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The draft budget would fund the top 15 school projects on the list, plus funds for three other schools in need of emergency fuel tank repairs. The top projects range from roof and boiler replacements to septic systems, fire suppression and safety upgrades in schools from Fairbanks to the Aleutian Islands.
In order to distribute funds more widely, members of the finance committee reduced funding for one project in Galena, in the Western Interior of Alaska, from roughly $35 million to $5 million for renovations to the Sydney C. Huntington Elementary and High Schools. They also allocated $17 million towards rebuilding the school in Stebbins in Western Alaska, after it burned down in 2024.
The Senate draft also adds nearly $14 million in funding for the state-run Mt. Edgecumbe High School, which has been the focus of public attention and concern after a quarter of students disenrolled this year. The additional facilities dollars include $10 million to remodel the dining hall, $3.1 million to replace dorm windows, $460,000 to replace dorm furniture, $50,000 to replace mattresses and $125,000 to replace aging laundry machines.
Finance members added $17 million to fund the top nine projects across the University of Alaska system — three projects each within the three major campuses.
Sen. Jesse Kiehl, D-Juneau, serves on the finance committee and his district includes University of Alaska Southeast. He described the proposed funds as a “nickel” compared to the “colossal” deferred maintenance needs of the university system.
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“That’s been built by Legislatures and Boards of Regents for 40 years,” he said on Wednesday, adding that it is a shared responsibility to put funding towards repairs and upgrades.
“The Constitution makes them a separate body within the executive branch that puts a lot of responsibility on them, too, more than the general state government,” he said “So university major maintenance is its own huge problem.”
The draft budget also includes $5.7 million for upgrades to state court facilities, mostly targeted to Anchorage and Sitka. It contains nearly $10 million for workforce development programs geared at the construction and oil and gas sectors, including for the Fairbanks Pipeline Training Center and Alaska Vocational Technical Center in Seward.
An amendment to add $25 million to the draft budget for the Port of Anchorage, sponsored by Sen. Kelly Merrick, R-Eagle River, was voted down on Tuesday by a 5 to 2 vote.
Before voting against the proposal, finance co-chair Sen. Lyman Hoffman, D-Bethel, said during committee deliberations the priority this year is to fund as many school maintenance projects on the list as possible, saying “schools are falling apart” and must be maintained to prevent further deterioration.
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“Students that are trying to learn deserve better,” Hoffman said. “And if we are not able to provide this major maintenance, we are going to see these schools continue to crumble, and the financial burden to the state of Alaska will be hundreds of millions of dollars to rebuild schools.”
More funding for school maintenance and other capital projects could be added by the Alaska House of Representatives, who will take up the draft budget bill after it’s approved by the Senate in the coming weeks.
Two US soldiers were wounded by a brown bear during a training exercise in Alaska on Thursday, the US Army stated.
Anchorage Daily News reported that the soldiers were from the 11th Airborne Division, and that the exercise had been a “land navigation training event” near Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.
State wildlife officials said that the bear attack seemed to be a defensive one, from a bear which had recently emerged from its den. Staff members from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game collected evidence at the scene in an attempt to learn more about the bear, such as its species and gender.
“The incident is currently under investigation, and we are working closely with installation authorities and local wildlife officials to gather all relevant information and ensure the safety of all personnel in the area,” the 11th Airborne Division said in a statement, reported ABC News.
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ABC News also cited an 11th Airborne Division spokesperson, Lt.-Col. Jo Nederhoed, who said that the two soldiers had been seriously wounded, but were receiving care at a hospital in Anchorage, and had shown improvement by Saturday morning.
“We hope both individuals have a full and quick recovery, and our thoughts are with them during this time,” Fish and Game Regional Supervisor Cyndi Wardlow said in a statement reported by Anchorage Daily News. “In this case, having bear spray with them in the field may have saved their lives.”
Both of the soldiers reportedly had and used bear spray during the attack.
The bear’s condition and whereabouts are currently unknown.
Up, up and away … that’s where most travel prices are going.
It’s true. Not only are our nation’s geopolitical thrusts in the Mideast affecting the cost of your fill-ups, every component of your trip from airfares to car rentals and hotel stays are subject to price hikes.
Imagine filling up a jetliner with jet fuel that’s doubled in price. It’s enough to melt your credit card, regardless of the number of points you get for every dollar spent!
Because the price of oil affects everything, higher prices are eating away at your travel budget in many ways.
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Bag fees
There’s lots of press on this. All airlines are increasing their checked-bag fees because of the jump in fuel prices.
Back in 2009, Alaska Airlines instituted a $15 fee for the first checked bag and $25 for the second bag. At the time, there was no charge for the first bag and a second bag was $25.
Last week, Alaska Airlines, along with other major airlines, increased its fees to $45 for the first checked bag and $55 for the second bag. Delta Air Lines charges the same.
Even if the cost of oil comes down, I don’t expect bag fees will ever be reduced.
Travelers who live in Alaska are somewhat insulated from the new hikes because both Delta and Alaska Airlines offer two free checked bags, with conditions:
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1. Alaska offers two free checked bags for travelers flying to or from Alaska who are enrolled in Club 49. This does not affect other flights on Alaska. Separately, ATMOS credit card holders can get a free checked bag. Also, elite members of the ATMOS scheme get one or two free checked bags systemwide.
2. Delta offers two free checked bags for travelers flying to or from Alaska who are SkyMiles members who live in Alaska. Again, this does not apply to other Delta flights. Separately, Delta American Express cardholders can get a free checked bag.
3. Elite-level travelers with the oneworld airline cartel, including Alaska Airlines, can get one or two checked bags on American, British Airways, Japan Airlines, Qantas or other oneworld carriers.
[Anchorage’s international airport rolls out self-driving wheelchairs]
Main Cabin vs. Basic Economy
The spread between the lowest available price, Basic Economy, and a more flexible ticket, Main Cabin, has increased. While the difference used to be $20-$30 each way when the Basic Economy scheme was introduced in 2018, the round-trip upcharge now can exceed $100.
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For example, the lowest Basic fare to Portland is $337 round-trip on Alaska Airlines. The upcharge to Main Cabin, with full loyalty points, pre-assigned seats and more flexibility on changes and cancellations, is $447, a 33% upcharge.
This trend is not specifically attributable to the new Iran War. It’s just a cost that continues to rise.
New fees
I’m impressed at the creativity of airline people who dream up new fees. Here are some of my favorites from Alaska Airlines:
1. Phone reservations: $15
2. Partner award booking fee: $12.50
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3. Pet travel fee: $100 in the cabin, $200 in the baggage compartment with a kennel
4. Left on board item return fee: $20
On Condor Airlines, operating the only nonstop service from Anchorage to Europe, travelers can choose from four different bundles in economy class. The least-expensive, Economy Zero, from $840 round-trip, features fees for travelers:
1. Carry-on bag fee, up to 8kg: $35; a small bag like a purse always is included for free
2. Checked bag: $75
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3. Airport check-in: $30
All three of these fees are included in the next-highest fare bucket, Economy Classic, from $900 round-trip. It’s cheaper to buy the bundle than it is to buy the components a la carte. Seat assignments are additional, from $25 for economy.
Airfares on the rise
There are a few good deals available for travel to select West Coast/Intermountain destinations in May, including:
1. Anchorage-San Francisco on Alaska Airlines, from $307 round-trip. Fly May 15-28 only. Add $90 round-trip for Main cabin.
2. Anchorage-Los Angeles on Alaska Airlines, from $317 round-trip. May 15-25 only. Add $90 round-trip for Main.
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3. Anchorage-Phoenix on United, Delta or Alaska, from $267-$287 round-trip. Fly May 8-June 9 only. Add $90-$100 for Main.
4. Anchorage-Denver $357 round-trip on Delta. Fly May 8-June 9 only. Add $90 round-trip for Main.
For travel to other destinations, or later in the summer, be prepared to pay more.
Flying to Hawaii? Alaska Air’s nonstop prices out at $706 round-trip between May 30 and June 6. Add $110 round-trip for Main.
Nonstop flights from Anchorage to Salt Lake City start at $669 round-trip with Delta on May 17. That’s $100 more than the cost for the same flights last month. Add $90 more for Main.
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Hotel costs continue to rise, accompanied by pesky resort fees.
The Outrigger on the Beach in Waikiki is a very nice beachfront hotel. It’s not plush, or the nicest property. But it’s solid. The cost is $334 per night.
But there’s more: a $50 per night resort fee, plus a variety of taxes and charges, totaling $112.55 per night.
Down in Seattle, the Sound Hotel in the Belltown neighborhood is marketed by Hilton. The discounted rate for “Honors” members — it’s free to join — is $313.34 per night for a king room in late May. Taxes and fees add an extra $56.40 per night.
There’s no appreciable bump yet for hotel rates as a result of the oil price surge. Yet. But if these hotel rates seem high, they’re in line with hotel rates in Anchorage this summer. At the Sheraton in Anchorage in June, it’s $450 per night, plus $54 in taxes and fees, when booked at Expedia.
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Car rentals are not cheap
My go-to site for car rentals is the Costco site, which compares major brands and automatically includes Costco discounts.
In Las Vegas, for a one-day rental in May, Budget charges $67 per day, which includes taxes and fees of $22.77. In Anchorage, the same kind of car, medium SUV, costs $92.97 with Alamo.
The biggest differences so far in car rental rates seems to be the bill you’ll pay when you fill up the tank before returning. There’s no appreciable jump in prices because of the new war.
When it comes to making travel arrangements for the spring and summer, it’s more risky making completely non-refundable arrangements.
I made the decision to purchase most of my summer travel plans in advance, but only after determining I would not need to change the dates. Particularly with airline tickets, it’s expensive to change your dates.
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There’s lots of uncertainty regarding travel arrangements, particularly international travel. As fuel prices go up due to oil shortages, travel companies will look for ways to recoup the increased costs. In most cases, those higher costs will be borne by travelers.
