Anchorage news

• Many more people seek medical help for opioid abuse

  01-08-2016 23:41 via ktoo.org
  
  Prescribing of oxycodone and other opioid pain pills rose sharply after 2000. (John Moore/Getty Images)
  Health care claims for people with opioid dependence diagnoses rose more than 3,000 percent between 2007 and 2014, according to an analysis of insurance records.
  The findings illustrate that the opioid problem is “in the general mainstream,” says Robin Gelburd, president of Fair Health, a nonprofit that analyzes health care costs and conducted the study.
  The researchers used d
  
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• Ninilchik tribe sets net in Kenai River

  01-08-2016 22:53 via ktoo.org
  The Ninilchik Traditional Council has for years sought approval to use a more effective method for catching their subsistence allocation of sockeye salmon on the Kenai River and late last week, they got that opportunity.
  On July 27, the Federal Subsistence Board approved the tribe’s emergency special action request to operate a community subsistence set net fishery on the Kenai.
  Approval came after a lawsuit filed in 2015.
  The change has drawn stiff opposition from other fishermen and
  
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• Denali Park road reopens on limited basis after mudslide

  01-08-2016 20:35 via ktoo.org
  Updated 10:35 a.m. Aug. 1: Officials at Alaska’s Denali National Park say vehicles are moving on a limited basis through an area hit by a mudslide on the only road into the park.
  The slide covered about 100 feet of road with debris about 10 feet deep.
  Park staff Sunday closed the road at Mile 67, beyond the Eielson Visitor Center, where most tour buses turn around to return to the park entrance.
  However, the mudslide temporarily stranded guests and employees at private lodges in Kantishna
  
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• Two dead in separate shootings in Anchorage during the weekend

  01-08-2016 19:52 via ktoo.org
  
  APD police vehicles (Photo by Wesley Early, Alaska Public Media – Anchorage)
  Two teenagers were killed over the weekend in separate shooting incidents in Anchorage.
  At about 2 a.m. Saturday, Anchorage Police Department were notified that Elijah Zeller, 18, was dropped off at an area hospital with a gunshot wound.Zeller was pronounced dead at the hospital. APD is investigating Zeller’s death as a homicide.
  Officers responded to the weekend’s second fatal shooting
  
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• Homer police handling more calls involving intoxicated people

  01-08-2016 19:46 via ktoo.org
  Homer Police Chief Mark Robl says the department has been responding to more calls involving intoxicated people this summer.
  “We’ve had over 56 calls now on just inebriated people – people drive by they see someone passed out on the park bench laying on the grass, stumbling, staggering, hard to walk, they’re going in and out of traffic and falling off the sidewalks, those types of calls. And in addition to that, we have other call – a shoplifting call where here&rsq
  
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• Maryland town begins cleanup after deadly weekend of flooding

  01-08-2016 18:35 via ktoo.org
  
  Rescue workers on Sunday look at the destruction caused by a flash flood on Main Street in Ellicott City, Md. (The Washington Post/Getty Images)
  “We thought we were gone,” one resident told The Washington Post.
  “The whole house shook.”
  Kelly Secret’s hometown of Ellicott City, Md., was torn apart by severe floods Saturday evening. More than 6 inches of rain in under three hours — a storm the National Weather Service says should happen only once every thousand
  
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• Two cases of Mumps in Fairbanks

  01-08-2016 06:29 via ktoo.org
  Fairbanks health officials say two cases of mumps have been confirmed in the area. The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reports that according to a statement from Fairbanks Memorial Hospital and Tanana Valley Clinic, both cases are associated with overseas travel.
  
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• Trees cut to make room for Talkeetna Airport expansions

  01-08-2016 06:29 via ktoo.org
  People living near the Talkeetna Airport are upset because expansions to the site have required many large trees to be cut down. KTUU-TV reports that residents say without the trees they have a clear view of the airport, which shuttles tourists and climbers to Denali as well as fielding local traffic .An ADOT spokeswoman says the FAA–funded project required the trees be removed.
  
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• Denali Mudslide leaves road closed

  01-08-2016 06:29 via ktoo.org
  Officials say that much of the only road that runs through Denali National Park has been closed after a large mudslide. Park staff on Sunday closed Denali Park Road at mile 67 just west of the Eielson Visitor Center after a mudslide Saturday morning covered the route with debris that is 100 feet wide and 100 feet deep.
  
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• U.S. Olympian Kim Rhode Takes Her Shot At History To Dispel Stigma

  01-08-2016 06:24 via ktoo.org
  
  Kim Rhode takes practice shots with the assist of her father Richard Rhode, who’s been her coach for 27 years.
  Nathan Rott
  It’s pushing 100 degrees outside and the Southern California sun is baking the fields of shattered clay at the Redlands Shooting Range — but it’s a training day for Kim Rhode, so she shoulders her 12-gauge over-under shotgun, dumps a few boxes of shells into her pockets and heads out to the skeet field.
  When you’re this close to the Olympic Game
  
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• Thousands Of Firefighters Battle Massive Big Sur Blaze

  01-08-2016 06:24 via ktoo.org
  
  A car destroyed by the Soberanes fire in Big Sur, Calif. Lodge managers and cafe owners there are facing cancelled bookings after fire officials warned that crews will likely be battling the fire for another month.
  Terry Chea/AP
  A wildfire on the central California coast has burned more than 38,000 acres and could continue throughout August. Already, the Soberanes fire has destroyed at least 60 homes, and one man died when a bulldozer he was driving near the fire line rolled over on steep terrai
  
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• Sawmill Farm, Tongass farm country

  01-08-2016 06:24 via ktoo.org
  
  Daniels oversees the ducks. She’s awaiting an order of pigs from Washington, set to arrive in August. In five years, she hopes to secure a USDA processing facility to sell local pork. (Emily Kwong/KCAW)
  Bobbi Daniels has struck gold, except it’s green and squishy.”
  “I’m getting grapes,” Daniels said. “Everything loves grapes. The chickens, the geese. I won’t give it to the geese.”
  The Tongass Rainforest isn’t what you’d picture as
  
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• Northern Alaska Peninsula has strong 2016 sockeye returns

  01-08-2016 06:24 via ktoo.org
  
  Wood River sockeye are pictured in this June 2016 photo.
  (Photo by KDLG Staff)
   
  Bob Murphy, the Area Management Biologist at Port Moller, said the North Peninsula has had a strong harvest so far this summer, with a little more than 3 million sockeye hauled in for the entire North Alaska Peninsula management area, including Nelson Lagoon and the Northwestern District harvests. That’s more than the 2.2 million sockeye harvest forecast.
  Area M fishermen have hauled in nearly 9 million s
  
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• Passengers rescued after tour boat sinks

  01-08-2016 05:06 via ktoo.org
  
  Two humpback whales near Juneau Saturday,  June 4, 2016. (Public Domain photo by NOAA Fisheries)
  Update: Capital City Fire and Rescue reported all of the tour boat’s passengers and crew refused medical treatment, including one person whose knee was injured.
  Two boats rescued the passengers of a whale watching vessel that sank Sunday.
  U.S. Coast Guard PO3 Lauren Steenson said the tour boat Big Red reported it was taking on water early in the afternoon.
  “Coast Guard Watchstanders
  
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