Damage from remnants of Typhoon Halong in Kipnuk on Monday, Oct. 13, 2025. (Courtesy Carolyn Hoover)
An unprecedented coastal storm has forced more than 1,400 people from their homes in Western Alaska while emergency officials scramble to place stranded residents seeking shelter in the region’s hardest-hit areas, state disaster officials said Tuesday morning.
The remnants of Typhoon Halong battered the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta region over the weekend with hurricane-force winds that gusted over 100 mph and caused catastrophic storm-surge flooding, destroying homes and infrastructure in many communities across the region.
Alaska State Troopers said Monday evening that they had found a deceased woman in the village of Kwigillingok. Two others remain missing in that community of about 400 residents near the mouth of the Kuskokwim River where surging floodwater tore dozens of homes from their foundations, sending them adrift.
While officials were still assessing the extent of the damage Tuesday morning, one of their immediate priorities was moving residents of Kipnuk and Kwigillingok — among the hardest-hit communities in the region — from schools to “more suitable locations,” the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management said in a situation report Tuesday. Kipnuk is a coastal community of 700 people roughly 100 miles southwest of Bethel.
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Nearly 60 people from Kipnuk and Kwigillingok spent the night in a shelter at the Armory in Bethel, according to Mary Horgan, a spokesperson for the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corp. The Bethel-based tribal health organization didn’t have a count for the number of people coming in Tuesday, “but we have been told that ‘hundreds’ of people are looking to evacuate at this time,” Horgan wrote in an email.
Damage from remnants of Typhoon Halong in Kipnuk on Monday, Oct. 13, 2025. (Courtesy Carolyn Hoover)
State officials say it remains unclear where more than 1,000 residents of Kipnuk and Kwigillingok who initially sought shelter at community schools after fleeing the storm and rising waters would be moved to.
The state Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management on Tuesday said it was coordinating the response with local, state, federal, tribal and private entities through the state Emergency Operations Center.
Organizations like the American Red Cross had sent personnel to Bethel to help with shelter operations while others were working to help provide food and supply distribution, according to the state agency. The Alaska National Guard had also been tasked with assisting sheltering and managing donation logistics.
Teams had been sent to affected communities to assess storm damage to infrastructure, like airport runways and water systems. Some affected communities, including Napakiak, Toksook Bay and Quinhagak, have reported issues with water systems being down, flooded power systems or severe erosion, according to state officials.
The Association of Village Council Presidents, which advocates on behalf of the 56 federally recognized tribes of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, said Tuesday that it had called on President Donald Trump to declare a national emergency and send federal assistance to Western Alaska.
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In its request, the group said that while Gov. Mike Dunleavy had declared a state emergency, the scope of the devastation required federal funding and manpower to aid recovery efforts.
“Western Alaska needs your intervention immediately, and we are ready to work with you to support our communities,” Vivian Korthuis, the group’s CEO, wrote in the letter. “Send federal aid. Help us protect lives and rebuild our communities and our future.”
JUNEAU, Alaska (KTUU) – The Supreme Court of Alaska will be taking up the case of the State of Alaska, Division of Elections v. Daniel J. Sullivan, Jr.
The oral arguments will be held Monday at 10 a.m. via Zoom, according to an order and opening notice.
The document also specifies that a decision is expected to be made before noon on Tuesday.
According to documents from the Division of Elections, the state must start printing ballots at noon on the same day.
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This comes after an Anchorage Superior Court Judge ordered Dan J. Sullivan on to the ballot Friday.
See a spelling or grammar error? Report it to web@ktuu.com
A new home under construction in Potter Valley in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)
This June, two very different offers reach Alaska families, and both amount to the same thing: $10,000. The difference is everything.
Bill Walker, running for governor, would hand every eligible Alaskan a one-time $10,000 check and then end the Permanent Fund dividend for good. Ask one question: Where does his $10,000 come from?
It comes from the Permanent Fund, the people’s own money and the savings Alaskans built for their children. Walker would spend that endowment once to pay Alaskans to give up the yearly dividend forever.
Think about what that does. It cancels the annual check that gives a family a reason to keep an Alaska address and replaces it with a single payout. You hand people their own savings, call it a gift and cut the tie that held them here in the same motion. It is the oldest mistake in governing money: raid what you have saved to buy a moment’s applause and call the spending generosity.
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A plan that spends the people’s savings to send the people away is not bold. It is foolish.
Now consider the other $10,000. Through Alaska Housing Finance Corp., the state offers families up to $10,000 to build a new, energy-efficient home. AHFC raids nothing. It earns its own way. Over the years, it has returned more than $2 billion to the state treasury, and it spends some of that income the way any good business does: to win a customer.
Here, the customer is an Alaskan who wants to own a home, put down roots and stay.
That is the oldest sound move in business: Invest a little of what you earn to bring in someone who stays. The homeowner remains, the community gains a family and the corporation keeps earning. The money spent comes back. A plan that puts earnings to work to bring people home is not charity. It is clever.
Same amount. Opposite source. Opposite wisdom. One spends savings; the other spends earnings. One pays Alaskans to leave; the other pays them to stay. One empties the state; the other fills it.
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This Homeownership Month, the choice is the size of a single check, and the whole question is where the check comes from and what it asks of you. Ten thousand dollars of your own fund, to wave you goodbye. Or $10,000, earned and reinvested, to help you stay and build.
Evan Swensen is the publisher of Publication Consultants in Anchorage and the author of “What’s the Money For: A Permanent Fund Mortgage Proposal.”
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