Coast Guard Survival School

On January 7, Ryan went to the survival school here in Kodiak that every CG person must attend if they live in Alaska. He spent three days and two nights outside surviving with as much supplies as would fit in a quart sized ziplock bag and no food. It was the coldest week this winter so far! The high one of the days was 15 degrees, and it got down to 5 degrees at night. He ate some strange food as not too much is out there this time of year. Among other things he ate the otter's favorite snack, sea urchin. His group of 6 guys had an exciting last night when the shelter they built caught on fire. There were two guys awake on fire watch. Ryan said he heard the word "Fire" and was on his feet out of the shelter before his eyes opened. They had to jump back in there for somebody's shoes and other supplies. The fire reached the height of a two story house, and they were afraid that they would set the forest on fire. They bravely took the shelter apart and smothered the fire to avoid an even bigger disaster. When the fire was out sometime after midnight, they built another shelter and tried to get a little sleep. He had a great time and has added to his wealth of outdoorsman knowledge. I will post some pictures shortly. He looks very tired, in the red fleece.

19 Bald Eagles died

Last Friday, one of the local canneries left a truck of fish guts outside and not closed up properly.   Many, many bald eagles swarmed in and gorged themselves on the fish guts.  Many of them got so covered in the oily slime that they could not fly out and got crushed in the guts. Some of the eagles froze because they couldn't get out and warm up. Once people realized what happened, they dumped the contents of the truck on the floor and gathered the flightless bald eagles.  The National Parks and Wildlife took them to a warehouse where they cleaned them and warmed them up.  Now some are being transported to Anchorage to get further care.  As of this morning, the number of eagles that ha died had reached 19.  Parks and Wildlife are investigating how this could happen.

MORE sad stories

I am sorry that I keep posting sad news from Kodiak.  Two things have happened over the last two weeks that are bad news.  There is a lot of good news too, so I will be sure and add some good news too!

On January 5 there was a horrible airplane accident and it was just about 2 miles from where we live.  There was a Piper PA-31 that took off from the Kodiak airport and quickly realized there was a problem.  The plane turned around to land but crashed less than 100m from the runway in the water.  It is amazing that 4 out of the 10 people on the plane survived.  A nearby pilot was able to pick up the four survivors on his float plane.  The victims were from outside of Homer and were heading home for Orthodox Christmas.  All of the passengers were fishermen based out of Kodiak.  The pilot was a former Army and Coast Guard pilot.  They think the luggage door opened and flew in to the propeller.  

Ryan and I heard the sirens, but had no idea what had happened.  This kind of thing hits the small community of Kodiak hard.  The pilot was a friend of my principal's.  His memorial packed the high school auditorium.  The owner of the airline is one of our student's father.  Just sad news for everybody.

Here is the full story:

http://www.kodiakdailymirror.com/?pid=19&id=5662

Sad Story - Bears

Ryan took a couple of his friends driving around Kodiak Island a couple of weeks ago so that they could see more of Kodiak than just the base and town. When they passed the American River, Ryan saw 4 bears cross the road! They stopped and snapped some photos of a sow and her three cubs. It was awesome. Ryan and I hadn't seen a bear yet except for one running from the dumpster in our neighborhood.

Yesterday when I read the Kodiak Daily Mirror, my jaw dropped. I saw the headline "Four bears euthanized after second charging incident." I read on to find out it happened at the American River. Two hunters had encountered what seemed to be one of the cubs charging them. He shot the bear (it seems unclear, the story said the cub charged, that the mom was sleeping, but it also says the mom was shot). Anyways, he was within his rights, feeling threatened. The mom had to be killed because of her injury, and the cubs because they couldn't live without their mom. How sad. This year was a bad year for berries, so the bears were out later trying to fatten up before going into hibernation. Usually they are already in dens by now. The report said that the mother was very thin for this time of year. It is hard to believe that the sweet bears in the photo are gone now.

Here is the link for the article:

www.kodiakdailymirror.com/?pid=19&id=5638

These pictures of the bears were taken 12/21/07

Happy 2008

Hi! I hope you had a wonderful New Years. We had a very relaxing and quiet Christmas break. Both of us had a lot of time off. We had a lot of snow on Christmas Eve and throughout the break. This was the most snow that Ryan and I have experienced yet. We loved it! Here are some pictures that I took over the break.


This is a view from our back porch. The mountain in the background is Barometer Mountain. It was before sunrise, probably about 9:45am. I took the picture from inside our living room. Kody usually won't look at me when I have the camera up to my face, I tricked him!

Here is Barometer on Christmas day.

Ryan shoveled a lot of snow on Christmas Eve and over the following days. I didn't help very much but had fun walking Kody in the slippery snow. He likes going for walks more than anything!