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Friday
September 06, 2013
Cruising the Tongass
The Sapphire Princess was photographed in the Mountain Point area, cruising the Tongass Narrows, heading south.
Front Page Photograph by RHONDA BOLLING ©2013
(Please respect the rights of photographers, never republish or copy
without permission and/or payment of required fees.)
Southeast Alaska: Thompson Files Letter of Intent to Run for State House By MARY KAUFFMAN - Glen Thompson, three term Assembly member for the Ketchikan Gateway Borough, has filed a Letter of Intent with the Alaska Public Offices Commission to be a candidate in the 2014 State Primary election for the State House of Representatives seat currently held by Peggy Wilson of Wrangell.
In an email to SitNews, Thompson said, "I've considered running for a couple of years but decided not to jump into the race last year because we had four pretty good candidates." He said, "Now a year later, I decided that I can be a positive force for Ketchikan and southern Southeast. I decided to enter the race now so that I will have enough time to put together a committee, do the necessary fund raising, and get out the vote." - More..
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Alaska: Governor Outraged at Needless Show of Force by EPA, BLM, DEC Agents; Calls for Special Counsel - After a week of internal review into reports of intimidation and needless show of force by federal and state officials, Governor Sean Parnell has ordered an investigation into the practices of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation’s (DEC) Environmental Crimes Unit and the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Criminal Investigations Division. The review comes after the governor learned that a state DEC investigator joined seven enforcement officers from the EPA and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to investigate placer miners in the Fortymile River area near Chicken. The agents, armed and wearing body armor, claimed they were looking for violations of Section 404 of the Clean Water Act. No arrests were made and no citations were issued.
“With a mere last minute notification to our DEC commissioner, Alaska’s attorney general, and the Department of Public Safety, the EPA, BLM and a DEC investigator took it upon themselves to swoop in on unsuspecting miners in remote Alaska,” Governor Parnell said. “This level of intrusion and intimidation of Alaskans is absolutely unacceptable. I will not tolerate any state agency’s participation in this sort of reckless conduct. There are many unanswered questions and I will seek a special counsel to get to the bottom of this matter and work to ensure it never happens again.” - More...
Friday - September 06, 2013
Ketchikan: Ketchikan Volunteer Fire Department receives $1,000 grant on behalf of Volunteer Service Award winner Tiffany Cook - Wells Fargo will contribute $1,000 to the Ketchikan Volunteer Fire Department in honor of Downtown Ketchikan Store Manager Tiffany Cook as part of Wells Fargo’s Volunteer Service Award program. The award and donation recognize Cook’s valuable contributions to the community as a volunteer firefighter.
Cook has served as a volunteer firefighter for the Ketchikan Volunteer Fire Department for three years. In 2012, she was named Ketchikan Fire Department Firefighter of the Year. She has completed 500 hours of training as a state-certified EMT-1 responder, exterior firefighter, and she is currently training to be a fire service instructor. Wells Fargo’s $1,000 Volunteer Service Award will fund local firefighter family support programs and community events. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Ketchikan: Ketchikan man arrested for allegedly selling heroin - After the conclusion of a drug operation, Aaron McColley, age 22 of Ketchikan was arrested by Ketchikan Police Detectives at approximately 6:00 PM Thursday.
The traffic stop took place in the 300 block of Carlanna Lakes Road with approximately .7 grams of heroin seized during the stop. According to a news release, the investigation reveled McColley had allegedly sold heroin to another person. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Ketchikan: UAS Ketchikan Offering New Maritime Industrial Skills Course - The University of Alaska Southeast Ketchikan is offering a new training course designed to prepare students for career opportunities in marine engineering departments, ship building and repair, heavy industrial machine repair, construction, and a variety of physical plant operations, such as seafood processing.
The course, Maritime Industrial Skills, will provide students with classroom and practical lab exercises and hands-on training with engines, electricity, welding, refrigeration, hydraulics, rigging, and firefighting plus other skills valuable to shipyards, seafood processor plants and other industries. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
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Southeast Alaska: Response team removes more gear from entangled whale, ends efforts – Marine mammal responders were partially successful in freeing an entangled humpback whale from gillnet near Angoon in Chatham Strait on Thursday, removing several additional fathoms of webbing before finalizing efforts late in the day.
Alaska Marine Mammal Stranding Network responders John Moran of NOAA Fisheries and Fred Sharpe of the Alaska Whale Foundation.
Photo by Steve Lewis, Chichagof Conservation Council, taken under NMFS permit #932-1905
“The tail and pectoral fins are free of gear, but the necklace of line behind the blowhole remains,” said Fred Sharpe of the Alaska Whale Foundation, a partner in NOAA Fisheries Alaska Marine Mammal Stranding Network. “We have removed the satellite telemetry buoy.”
“We have exhausted all appropriate techniques presently available to us in this very challenging disentanglement effort,” said NOAA’s Alaska Marine Mammal Stranding Network Coordinator Aleria Jensen. “This full-grown, adult, humpback whale is still in robust condition, and was last seen swimming vigorously, and remains strong. It is likely that less than 30 fathoms (180 feet) of gear remain trailing on the animal. The entanglement is not immediately life threatening, and our hope is that the whale can now shed the remaining gear on its own.”
“We want to thank everyone for the remarkable time, effort, and brain trust that went into assisting this whale,” added Sharpe, noting that the Petersburg Marine Mammal Center, Alaska Sea Grant, Alaska Whale Foundation, and the Chichagof Conservation Council all participated in the effort.
The humpback whale first became entangled in a tended gillnet in Frederick Sound near Petersburg, Alaska on August 23. A NOAA Fisheries-trained and authorized team from the PMMC and Alaska Sea Grant initially responded and determined the entanglement was life-threatening. Although the Petersburg team could not free the animal, they did manage to attach a satellite buoy so that the whale could be tracked. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
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Alaska Science: A supertanker voyage through the Northwest Passage By NED ROZELL - Forty-six years ago, a ship long as the Empire State Building sailed with intention toward obstacles that captains usually avoid. The icebreaking tanker SS Manhattan was an oil company’s attempt to see if it might be profitable to move new Alaska oil to the East Coast by plowing through the ice-clogged Northwest Passage.
The SS Manhattan on its 1969 journey from Pennsylvania through the Northwest Passage to Alaska and then back to New York.
Photo by Merritt Helfferich
Begging his way aboard was Merritt Helfferich, then 31 and a do-all guy at the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Helfferich heard of Humble Oil and Refining Company executives recruiting a team of Alaska engineers to ride the ship and measure the properties of sea ice it crushed along the way. When the ship’s launch was delayed and other professors needed to teach their fall classes, Helfferich was soon gasping in wonder at a dock in Halifax, Nova Scotia. There, he saw the giant ship he was to ride all the way north to Prudhoe Bay.
The largest ship ever to fly an American flag, the SS Manhattan busted its way north in search of heavy ice. If the Manhattan could prove its worth, Stan Haas and others with Humble Oil envisioned the recently discovered North Slope oil moving away from Prudhoe Bay in superships that would be even larger.
The late 1960s were the days before the oil pipeline across Alaska; executives wondered how the crude in the magnificent new Prudhoe Bay discovery might find a way to the masses. In 1968, a group of oil companies gambled that a trans-Alaska pipeline would prove more profitable than tankers. Before they got any permits, the consortium purchased 800 miles of fine-grain steel pipe from Japanese companies.
“Eight-hundred miles of one-eighth-inch pipe was not cheap,” Helfferich said as he recently shared his memories. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Southeast Alaska: Front Street Clinic may possibly have a second life - Recently, the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC) announced that they would be closing the Front Street Clinic (FSC) for the homeless in Juneau. The closure was slated for October 1, 2013. Thanks to the efforts of several State, City and local agencies and dedicated individuals, the clinic will now stay open till the end of April 2014.
Several meetings later and within the last few days, over $100,000 has been raised for the Front Street Clinic thanks to such varied sources as private local foundations and emergency room physicians. The Juneau Community Foundation is launching a campaign to raise the remaining emergency funds needed. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013 |
Safari Quest
The 22-guest Safari Quest's only visit this year to Ketchikan on 9/6/13. The Safari Quest was built in 1992 by Shear Yachts; renovated in 2006. n 1997, American Safari Cruises pioneered yacht cruising in Alaska. InnerSea Discoveries enjoyed its inaugural season of expedition-style active exploration of Southeast Alaska’s Inside Passage in the summer 2011, and in January 2013, the company changed its name to Un-Cruise Adventures.
Front Page Photograph By STEVE SPEIGHTS ©2013
(Please respect the rights of photographers, never republish or copy
without permission and/or payment of required fees.)
Southeast Alaska: Decision on Greens Creek tailings facility released - The Tongass National Forest issued a decision today to allow a limited expansion of Hecla Greens Creek Mining Company’s (GCM) tailings facility in Admiralty Island National Monument (ANM).
Greens Creek Mine, owned by Hecla Mining, started production in 1989 and today is Juneau’s largest private sector employer. It produced over six million ounces of silver in 2012 and is projected to do so again in 2013. It is one of the world’s largest silver mines and produces gold, lead and zinc in important quantities as well.
One of the largest private employers in Southeast Alaska, Greens Creek Mine is responsible for approximately 330 permanent, full-time jobs. The mining company has estimated that, without the expansion, it would have to close operations in 2019, before it is able to mine its known reserves.
In today's decision, Tongass National Forest Supervisor Forrest Cole announced the selection of a modified Alternative D from the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), with those modifications described in the Record of Decision (ROD). The primary modification is not to authorize construction of a second tailings disposal facility in the Fowler Creek watershed as described in Alternatives C and D of the Final EIS. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Southeast Alaska: Crowley Completes Acquisition of Taku Oil Sales in Juneau – Crowley’s Alaska fuel sales and distribution company, CPD Alaska, LLC, has completed its acquisition of Taku Oil Sales, Inc. located in Juneau. Taku, founded in 1953 by Clarence E. Jacobsen, is a well known and respected local fuel company that has been serving the Southeastern Alaska community of Juneau for more than 50 years.
Jeff Hansen, president of Taku, and the Jacobsen family are leaving the oil business to pursue other interests. The company operates a 2.5 million-gallon bulk fuel storage terminal, a deep-water marine fuel dock and two service stations in the Juneau area.
While the leadership at Taku will change, the company will continue to provide great products and services under the Taku brand name. The company’s 13 employees have been welcomed as new members of the Crowley team. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
Alaska: EPA fines Shell for Clean Air Act permit violations during offshore oil exploration in Alaska - Thursday the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced settlements with Shell Gulf of Mexico, Inc. and Shell Offshore, Inc. for violations of their Clean Air Act permits for arctic oil and gas exploration drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, off the North Slope of Alaska.
Based on EPA’s inspections and Shell’s excess emission reports, EPA documented numerous air permit violations for Shell’s Discoverer and Kulluk drill ship fleets, during the approximately two months the vessels operated during the 2012 drilling season.
In Thursday’s settlements, Shell has agreed to pay a $710,000 penalty for violations of the Discoverer air permit and a $390,000 penalty for violations of the Kulluk air permit. - More...
Friday PM - September 06, 2013
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the editor at editor@sitnews.us or call 617-9696
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 Ketchikan Performing Arts Center By Lallette Kistler - I addressed the Borough Assembly Tuesday night about the fact that the Legislative Lobbying committee ignored the Ketchikan Performing Arts Center project last week, and I thought the greater community might be interested in what I had to say. It didn't make sense that we were their #1 and the community's #4 last year, but this year we weren't even going to be numbered at all. - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
Agree With Kiffer, No Nightmare By Keith Stump -
Having been a passenger on the Millennium when it had to return to Ketchikan due to mechanical difficulties to one of its electric propulsion motors, it was interesting to hear and read about the trip cancellation and other passenger responses. My take is that much ado was made about not much by the news media. - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
Syria - Count The Cost By Glenn Mollette - The President and Congress will make the decisions when it comes to Syria. They and military leadership have far more information than I. However, we will not go into Syria, throw our rocks and run back home unscathed. The scathing may occur immediately or weeks or months later. - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
Obama's war in Syria By Marvin Seibert -
War on Syria, here we are going to use Guided Missiles, B52 and B1 bombers and up to 75,000 troops on the ground. Our Delusional Narcissistic President is trying to save face by putting our troops in harm's way. What arrogance, he now says he did not draw a red line -- video does not lie. What else do you need to know that our President is incapable of decisions and taking responsibility for anything! - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
RE: Let's prioritize wild Alaska salmon By Lois Morgan -
Hooray, Heather. Your phrase 'the countries preeminent salmon forest' totally rang my bell. I've never heard or seen it, and it is just so apt I hooted out loud. I've been needing this phrase. - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
WHAT IS YOUR POINT? By David G. Hanger -
Exactly what is your point, Laura Plenert? You refer to the murder of an Australian student athlete in Oklahoma, a case of which I am quite aware, as somehow racially motivated. All in fact you are doing when you do that is parrot the nonsensical and racist views of Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge, who are the only individuals stupid enough and corrupt enough to attempt to use this case as a racial counterpoint to the Trayvon Martin case. While you are doing a fine job of parroting the views of your lords and masters, the facts of the case are quite a bit more problematical in that regard. How exactly do you get racial motivations out of this crime when one of the suspects is black, one is half-black and half-white, and the third is all white? - More...
Saturday - September 07, 2013
Parrot whiner By Karl Shlaudeman -
Well Mr. Hanger you might want to make sure that you are bleeding and hurt before you ever take appropriate action or defend yourself against a criminal. I truly wish all of you would wake up and realize there is no perfect world; white, black or whatever. - More...
Saturday - September 09, 2013
Labor Day Message By Gov. Sean Parnell -
While many have the day off, plenty of Alaskans will show up for work – cashiers, technicians, medical professionals and pipeline workers. Our public safety network – troopers, police officers, firefighters and EMTs, members of the Guard and other military service members – are all on the job, keeping Alaskans safe. - More...
Monday PM - September 02, 2013
A view worth capturing By Marshall H. Massengale -
Every once in a while, the KPU Webcam manages to catch a view worth capturing as a feature photograph for publication on the SITNews Website. Here is attached one that I captured this morning at 7:42 AM Local Time this morning 9/2/2013 from KPU Cam 1. The sunburst from behind Deer Mountain illuminates all the back space behind the cruise ship docked at Pier 1, providing something of a surreal dreamscape. - More...
Monday PM - September 02, 2013
Pot Meet Kettle By Chris Elliott -
Mr. Hanger, I'm sure the local Native American & Filipino communities are thrilled with your unflattering characterization of them as little more than tough thugs. Your sensitivity is astonishing. - More...
Monday PM - September 02, 2013
Re: Let's prioritize wild Alaska salmon By Mike Svenson -
After reading Heather Hardcastle's letter on the Tongass, I have a question for her. She wants all activities out of the Tongass and the fishermen will receive all the benefits of this. Limited entry was started in the mid 70s because there was not many fish. - More...
Monday PM - September 02, 2013
RE: Parrots By Duane Hill - Thank you, but let's not allow the discussion to be diverted to one of race or ethnicity, and who did what to whom. That is a "no win" discussion. If he wishes to push the issue in that direction, I'm certain that some lawyer would be happy to take a libel suit on spec, especially if I offer to cooperate for a split just large enough to cover my expenses and lost wages. - More...
Monday PM - September 02, 2013
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