ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – Coming soon to Juneau-area roads; a trio of festively-named snowplows!

After hundreds of suggested names were entered in its annual naming contest, the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities announced Monday that it had narrowed its search down to three winning names for three of its snowplows.

The winning names were Berminator, Salt-O-Saurus Rex, and Ka-PLOW.

The names were chosen by DOT staff who felt they were most appropriate and represented Alaska the best, according to Eli Kesten-Brackett, a project assistant with the department.

“Since they move in formation, [DOT] thought it’d be cool to have them all named as a unit,” Kesten-Brackett said.

The Name-A-Snowplow contest that ended on Nov. 28 saw over 400 individual entries from residents around the state.

Kesten-Brackett said after noticing the popularity of similar contests in other snow-laden states in the Lower 48, the state thought a way to get people’s creative juices flowing was what Alaska needed.

“We thought this would be an awesome way to foster community engagement,” Kesten-Brackett said.

The winning name in the inaugural contest last year was Darth Blader, according to Kesten-Brackett.

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PHOENIX (AZFamily) — Maricopa County has declared Monday through Wednesday as ‘no burn days.’ County leaders say there are elevated levels of smoke in the air.

The poor air quality was visible in the Valley Monday as the Arizona’s Family news drone captured video of the layers of pollution. It could be seen from Camelback Mountain through downtown Phoenix.

It’s common to see the dirty air this time of year. There are more people visiting Arizona through the holidays, which means more cars and more air pollution.

There are also more people burning inside to heat their homes, which sends smoke into the air. People will also light off fireworks around the holidays, which can add to the already poor air quality.

While the weather is beautiful around the Valley this time of year, it can be the deadliest time in Arizona. According to numbers from the Arizona Department of Health Services, January is the deadliest month of the year.

In 2022, more than 8,300 people died in Arizona, nearly 2,000 more than any other month. December was second-highest, with more than 6,700 people who died.

Air pollution could be a contributing factor to the increased deaths in our state.

Dr. Ashley Lowe with the College of Nursing at the University of Arizona works with many Arizona schools. She says these months are when more kids are going to the nurse with breathing problems and says air pollution is a big reason why.

“We do tend to have an uptick in the number of visits to the health office because kids are having breathing problems,” Lowe said. “All of these things come together to create a perfect storm.”

Dr. Lowe says kids with asthma can especially be impacted from the dirty air. She says she doesn’t want kids to stay away from their practices and other events, but it’s best to limit exposure outdoors on some of the worst air quality days.

If you are struggling to breathe, shutting the windows and doors around your home can help by keeping the polluted air outside of your home.

An indoor air filter can also clean out the bad particles from the air inside your home.

The weather also plays a role in why the bad air can stick around for days or even weeks this time of year. While it’s beautiful outside, the weather is normally calm which means there is no wind or rain to push the dirty air away.

“We live already in a valley kind of in a bowl and everything kind of settles. You get warm afternoons and cold mornings so that inversion sets in and it kind of traps everything,” Arizona’s Family First Alert Meteorologist April Warnecke said. “It would help to get wind or rain but those are the two things we don’t have in the forecast.”

Air quality trackers can show where the worst of the polluted air is.

According to AirNow, Christmas and New Year’s can have the worst air quality of the year. There were readings of “very unhealthy” air quality during the holidays in 2023.

The CDC says chronic respiratory disease is the fifth leading cause of death in Arizona each year.

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Words of caution circulated online after a portion of the Santa Cruz Wharf in California broke off and drifted into the surrounding waters on Dec. 23.

Two people with minor injuries were rescued and transported to a local hospital, and a third made their way to safety on their own after the partial collapse happened at 12:45 p.m. PT, according to Santa Cruz officials. No deaths were reported.

A bystander-captured video and shared on X of a large part of the wharf, which is similar to a pier but often smaller, and its debris drifting in the water on the same day. The video owner is credited as Harrison Patiño. A second video, viewed by TODAY.com, shows a small, house-like wooden structure floating in the ocean following the partial collapse.

The 2,745-foot-long wharf has long been a local landmark and tourist attraction and was constructed in 1914, according to the City of Santa Cruz website. It is the sixth wharf to have existed at the site just off of Beach Street.

On X, the press office for Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, cautioned residents and visitors to avoid the area and follow local guidance.

“Newsom has been briefed on a previously damaged section of the Santa Cruz pier that broke off due to heavy surf,” the post reads in part. “(California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services) is coordinating with local officials and is ready to provide support.”

In a press conference later in the day, Santa Cruz officials confirmed that authorities had braced for potential damage to the wharf ahead of time due to strong storms and swell.

“We also would tell people that we want them to stay away,” Rob Oatey of the Santa Cruz Fire Department said. “We pointed out before, the ocean right now is extremely dangerous, so we’re telling all people to stay away, to observe from a safe distance. It’s the holidays, and we have people visiting from out of the area. Observe from a very safe distance. And if they can observe online.”

The official cautioned that debris from the wharf will continue to spread in the ocean and that storms would continue to affect the area for the next four or five days.

The Santa Cruz Wharf has now been closed to the public.