A rockslide near Ketchikan on Thursday morning has blocked the island’s main road, leaving people who live north of the slide cut off from the city and its airport. It’s not clear when the road will be open again, but city and borough officials are urging residents to make plans for an extended closure.
“We understand how frustrating it is,” said Alaska Department of Transportation spokesman Sam Dapcevich. “It’s divided the community literally, and we’re hoping to get it reopened as soon as possible, so that people can get where they need to go.”
The slide came down at 10:55 a.m. near Wolfe Point just north of the airport ferry terminal, completely blocking Tongass Avenue. SECON, a construction company contracted by the Transportation Department, has been doing blasting in recent days along the hillside where the slide occurred as part of a hazard mitigation project to improve the slope’s stability.
Dapcevich said it’s too early to say if that caused the slide.
“I do know that the construction work at that area was to mitigate the hazards that already existed. So there’s been rock slides there in the past, and that’s why they’re working there,” Dapcevich said.
SECON spokeswoman Marianne Kordowski directed questions to the Transportation Department.
City and borough officials said in a press release that they can’t begin clearing the road until state landslide experts can assess the stability of the hillside. They are expected to arrive around 5p.m. Thursday evening.
But Dapcevich said Department of Transportation geological engineers have already begun the assessment while they’re in transit.
“They just want to make sure that the risk is low of more material coming down before they start sending people in there,” he said.
For now, Allen Marine Tours is shuttling trapped residents across the slide area with a tour boat, which is going back and forth between Taquan on the south side of the slide to The Ketch on the north side. To use the free service, call 907-228-4635.
There are two fire stations north of the slide, but the island’s only hospital is south of the slide. Officials say they have a workaround in place to transport hospital patients across the slide zone.
Borough transit services are suspended for areas north of the slide.
The state Department of Transportation wrote on social media that the slide location is “complex and unsafe,” but that they would work to clear a single lane for emergency vehicles once geologists give the OK.
The city and borough has launched a joint emergency operations center, similar to last August’s fatal landslide in the White Cliff neighborhood. Emergency responders are currently setting up lights in preparation to work through the night.
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