The full extent of the storm’s effects may not be clear for days, but residents across the state’s low-lying West Coast are still struggling with water damage, power outages and other hazards. The affected areas span more than 1,000 miles of coastline, including “some of the most remote areas in the United States,” according to Jeremy Zidek, public information officer for the Alaska Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. “It’s a very large area and the damage in that area really varies quite a bit,” Zidek said. “Access to these areas is very difficult.” The storm is still lingering in the northwestern part of the state, Zidek said. No injuries or deaths have yet been reported from the storm, but Alaska state troopers are searching for a young boy missing from Hooper’s Bay, one of the hardest-hit villages. For years, scientists have expressed concern that climate change has set the stage for greater impacts from major non-tropical cyclones in Alaska. Warmer summers and oceans have caused greater-than-normal seasonal loss of sea ice, making the region more vulnerable to ocean flooding. Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) declared a state of emergency Saturday in anticipation of the “unprecedented” storm. Communities along the low-lying west coast saw severe flooding and violent winds. Roads – of which there are few in the area – have been battered and washed out. The storm surge knocked out communication lines, caused evacuations and tore homes from their foundations. An uninhabited house was swept away until it got stuck under the Snake River bridge. The tide gauge in Nome, known as the finish line of the famed Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, showed water levels more than nine feet above normal early Saturday, surpassing the peak seen during wild storms in 2011 and 2004, according to the National Weather Service. A fire broke out Saturday at the Bering Sea Bar and Grill in Nome amid high winds. An offshore buoy reported waves at 35 feet or higher for 12 hours, peaking over 50 feet, while winds gusted over 70 mph for 11 hours. Dozens of small, mostly indigenous communities along the coast face unique challenges as they try to recover from the damage before winter arrives, according to Rick Thoman, a climate expert at the International Center for Arctic Research. “All these communities, there are basically no road connections to any of them,” Thoman said. “It’s a very different setting than anywhere in the Lower 48.” Corridors will need to be safely cleared before communities can receive critical supplies, Thoman said, since most goods are flown or barged into the region. Without power, people with packed freezers risk losing their food for next season. “If your plant goes out, you can’t get power from somewhere else if it’s not a generator at your house,” Thoman said. The system that battered Alaska over the weekend was the remnants of Pacific Hurricane Merbok, which merged with a pair of non-tropical storms as it headed toward the Bering Strait, the thin strip of water between Russia and Alaska. It’s not new for Alaska to be hit by the aftermath of a former hurricane, Thoman said, but this one came fast and furious, taking a shorter path than usual. “This one was special because of how strongly it developed,” Thoman said. It was also unusually massive, larger than Texas and nearly as large as Alaska, according to Kaitlyn Lardeo, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Fairbanks. Most of the affected areas saw winds between 60 and 80 miles per hour, he said. “It’s important for people to understand that these things are possible for us,” Lardeo said. “It was devastating for many communities.” Mark Springer, the mayor of Bethel, said his city, which is about 60 miles inland from the Bering Sea, is far enough from the worst of the flooding to avoid much of the property damage. But the water rises “from above” in some places. Springer said he heard that villages lost their grills and smokehouses, as well as sheds where people keep their equipment and machines. Social media timelines were filled with photos of flooding and evacuations. Many boats drifted and sank, cutting off another vital means of transportation. “The boats will be scattered across the tundra,” Springer said. “In some cases, they’re going to have to wait until the ground freezes and go with snow machines and try to drag them out.” The massive storm surge and giant waves would have caused severe beach erosion at any time of the year, but the fact that the storm hit in September increased the risk of erosion. It also arrived during hunting season, meaning hundreds of people who may have been hunting in the remote Alaska wilderness would not have access to updates about the storm and could be stuck offline. The Nome-Council Road, used by hunters and Alaskans to travel inland from the Bering Sea coast, has been partially washed away. Major flooding was also reported in the small coastal communities of Chevak, Kotlik, Newtok, Golovin and Shaktoolik, where multiple evacuations were required. The region is particularly vulnerable to erosion, with some stretches of coastline losing up to 100 feet of land to the sea each year, according to the Fourth National Climate Assessment, a comprehensive report on climate change that examines the effects on the United States that published in 2018. “Longer sea-ice-free periods, higher land temperatures and associated sea-level rise are expected to exacerbate flooding and accelerate erosion in many areas, leading to loss of terrestrial habitats and cultural resources and claiming entire communities, such as Kivalina in the northwest Alaska, for relocation to safer ground,” the report states. In Shaktoolik – home to more than 200 people – the stone wall of gravel, sand and driftwood that protected the settlement from the sea was destroyed, according to the Anchorage Daily News. Residents were forced to evacuate and take shelter inside a school. Update: The storm destroyed Shaktoolik’s stone, its main protection from the sea, says Mayor Lars Sookiayak. “We are very heartbroken,” he said. He’s worried about tonight, when seas are expected to pound the coastline again. Photo by Gloria Andrew. pic.twitter.com/H0J4fqHfxj — Alaska Public Media News (@AKpublicnews) September 18, 2022 “It was very difficult to take,” Mayor Lars Sukiyak told the newspaper. “Pretty heartbreaking.”
