Hundreds of people airlifted from storm-hit western Alaska villages in historic mass evacuation

Hundreds of people were evacuated from the western Alaska village. Kipnuk on Wednesday after residents were ordered to pack just one bag and leave the community, one of the hardest hit by a catastrophic storm that flooded swaths of the Yukon-Kuskokwim region over the weekend.

A similar mass evacuation in Kwigillingok, a Yup’ik village of about 400 residents, was confirmed Wednesday evening in a statement from state Emergency Operations Center officials.

In what officials called “one of the largest airlift efforts in recent Alaska disaster response history,” the Alaska National Guard and other agencies used helicopters and even a massive C-17 Globemaster III military transport plane to move more than 300 people from their villages to shelters in Bethel and Anchorage, hundreds of miles away. there, where the majority of evacuees will be sent.

Hundreds of displaced residents of Kipnuk and Kwigillingok were airlifted from Bethel to an American Red Cross shelter in Anchorage on Wednesday, state emergency officials said. The Alaska Rescue Coordination Center reported receiving “an overwhelming number of calls for non-critical evacuations,” according to an update Wednesday evening.

The storm has left the houses uninhabitable and utilities unusable in communities across the region, displacing more than 1,000 people from their homes. Just over 1,300 people were sheltering in schools in eight communities as of Tuesday evening, according to a situation report from the Alaska State Emergency Operations Center.

Kipnuk, a Yup’ik community of about 700 residents near the Bering Sea coast, suffered the most extreme damage from the storm, as did Kwigillingok, located at the mouth of the Kuskokwim River.

The storm claimed at least one life and left two people missing, all in Kwigillingok. Alaska State Troopers said three family members were last seen in a house that broke loose and floated toward the Bering Sea amid record tidal surges.

The body of Ella Mae Kashatok, 67, was found Monday. Vernon Pavil, 71, and Chester Kashatok, 41, are still missing. The search for their floating home covered about 88 square miles, according to rescue officials.

Soldiers said Tuesday that active searches by military aircraft for the men had been suspended. On Wednesday, the Association of Village Council Presidents said village public safety officers, volunteers and others “remain actively engaged in ongoing recovery efforts” using pull-up bars, sonar equipment and coordinated efforts.

In Kipnuk, up to 600 residents spent several nights in a shelter located at the local school. The occupants of the shelter were informed Wednesday that they had to leave, according to several village residents.

The state has not issued any mandatory evacuation orders, said Jeremy Zidek, a spokesman for the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

However, Kipnuk and Kwigillingok “have requested that the state and the Alaska National Guard support a full evacuation of both communities,” Zidek said Wednesday.

At least some evacuees will travel to Anchorage: The University of Alaska Anchorage will house 300 displaced residents in the Alaska Airlines Center arena on campus, according to the American Red Cross. Displaced residents will receive beds, food, emergency relief supplies, emotional support and health services.

People were expected to arrive in Anchorage Wednesday evening, according to Katie Bender, UAA director of marketing and communications. She added that it is still not clear how many residents will arrive, or from which villages they have been evacuated.

As of Tuesday evening, hundreds of people were sheltering in schools in many villages, including 400 in Kwigillingok, 50 in Napakiak, 109 in Nightmute, 70 in Tuntutuliak, 50 in Chefornak and 30 in Nunam Iqua, according to the state situation report released Wednesday.

(Here’s how to help those affected and displaced by storms in Western Alaska)

The storm damaged nearly every home in Kipnuk, located 98 miles southwest of Bethel. Conditions are deteriorating at the school, where 600 people took shelter last night, according to the emergency operations center report.

The community had asked for more water and “help for a broken school generator,” the report said. The National Weather Service also predicted another storm, albeit a weaker one, would move through the area Wednesday evening.

On Wednesday, authorities visited the school’s remaining residents to announce a mandatory evacuation, according to videos posted online by Buggy Carl, a Kipnuk resident and emergency response manager.

People are suffering, he tells people watching the video, one of many he was asked to film. updates on the situation on the ground in the community.

“So many tears. They’re just crying their eyes out. I understand their pain and their frustration, but it’s for their own safety,” Carl says to the camera.

Jacqui Lang, a teacher at Chief Paul Memorial School in Kipnuk, said many residents don’t want to go there. Everyone was told they had to leave their pets and almost all their possessions behind.

Evacuation “is no longer optional,” she said. “They say the school is not safe.”

People were flown in large Black Hawk helicopters as well as small private planes, Lang said.

On Wednesday, she was trying to coordinate with a Bethel animal rescue to get animals still in the village out, putting out duct-tape collars with owner information to help owners find the animals if air transport could be arranged.

In a post Wednesday, Bethel Friends of Canines said they are coordinating with Kipnuk teachers to take pets whose futures would otherwise be uncertain out of the village and bring them to Bethel. The group said people were helping in “creative ways,” including private pilots transporting animals and a few dogs going by boat to nearby villages such as Chefornak “where regular flights can get to Bethel and beyond much more quickly.”

State officials said Wednesday evening that while evacuating people was the priority, efforts were underway to coordinate rescues of stranded and displaced animals.

“People are devastated,” Lang said. “They don’t want to leave.”

Most of the people evacuated by air from remote villages, accessible only by air, head first to the regional center of Bethel, where an armory is set up to house about 100 evacuees, and donations pile up. Other evacuees said they wanted to join family members in neighboring, less damaged communities in the area, Lang said.

As of Wednesday evening, “shelter operations expanded beyond the Bethel Regional Center, where capacity is reaching its limit,” state emergency management officials said in a statement. “Hundreds of survivors are being moved to safe, warm shelters outside the region, in coordination with local communities, tribal organizations, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation and the Association of Village Council Presidents. »

The goal, Zidek said, is also to make less damaged homes habitable before winter arrives.

“We’re going to look to do this in every community possible, to bring people home,” he said. “We are preparing to provide medium and long term accommodation for people who cannot return home in the short term.”

The American Red Cross has brought in additional personnel from across the country to help in Anchorage and Bethel to meet mass shelter and care needs, according to state emergency officials. The Global Central Kitchen has arrived and is coordinating feeding survivors in the shelters, they said. The Salvation Army supports mass care and works to coordinate donations and housing needs.

Officials with the state’s emergency operations center said they received mutual aid from other states, including Colorado, Virginia, South Carolina, Texas and Arkansas.

Daily News reporter Bella Biondini contributed to this report.