Sarah Palin loses Alaska special election to Democrat Mary Peltola

Peltola’s victory in the state’s first ranked choice voting election makes her the first Alaska Native to serve in the House

The Democrat Mary Peltola has won the special election for Alaska’s only US House seat, besting a field that included the Republican Sarah Palin, who was seeking a political comeback in the state where she was once governor.

Peltola, who is Yup’ik and turned 49 on Wednesday, will become the first Alaska Native to serve in the House and the first woman to hold the seat. She will serve the remaining months of the late Republican US Representative Don Young’s term. Young held the seat for 49 years before his death in March.

Continue reading...

Liz Cheney looks set to lose Congress seat to Trump-backed rival

Polls show congresswoman trailing far behind conservative lawyer Harriet Hageman in Wyoming’s Republican primary

Widely praised for her defence of democracy during the January 6 committee hearings, Liz Cheney looks set to lose her seat in Congress on Tuesday to a rival backed by former US president Donald Trump.

Opinion polls show Cheney trailing far behind conservative lawyer Harriet Hageman – who has echoed Trump’s false claims of widespread voter fraud – in a Republican primary election to decide Wyoming’s lone member in the House of Representatives.

Continue reading...

Alaska family’s blind golden retriever found after being lost for three weeks

Construction crew found elderly Lulu in bushes after thinking she was a bear

An Alaska family had given up hope of finding their blind, elderly golden retriever who wandered away from their home three weeks ago, but a construction crew found Lulu in salmonberry bushes after initially confusing her for a bear.

Lulu was barely alive after being found Tuesday, but she is being nursed back to health and is back home with her family, the Daily Sitka Sentinel reported.

Continue reading...

Four bears killed at Alaska park reserved for homeless people

Bears were stealing food from tents at campground in Anchorage that provides shelter but is also bear country

Alaska wildlife officials have killed four black bears in a campground recently reserved for people in Anchorage who are homeless after the city’s largest shelter was closed.

Employees from the Alaska department of fish and game on Tuesday killed a sow and her two cubs and another adult bear that was acting separately, stealing food from tents inside Centennial Park, which is managed by the city, officials said.

Continue reading...

Sarah Palin leads in special primary for Alaska’s House seat in comeback bid

Run by former Republican vice-presidential candidate marks first bid since resigning as governor partway through her term in 2009

Former Alaska governor and Republican ex-vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin leads in early results from Saturday’s special primary for the state’s only US House seat in what could be a remarkable political re-emergence.

Voters in the far north-western state are whittling down the list of 48 candidates running for the position that was held for 49 years by the late US Representative Don Young.

Continue reading...

Sarah Palin announces run for US Congress in Alaska

The former governor says she will ‘combat the left’s socialist, big-government, America-last agenda’

Sarah Palin has announced her run for Alaska’s only seat in the US House of Representatives, marking her first run for public office in over a decade.

“America is at a tipping point,” Palin said in a statement released on her Twitter account announcing her candidacy. “As I’ve watched the far left destroy the country, I knew I had to step up and join the fight.

Continue reading...

Iditarod sledders punished for sheltering dogs during winter storm

Race marshal says trio’s decision to bring dogs inside ‘affected the competition for racers’ as Peta condemns Alaska race

A fierce winter storm in the last stretch of this year’s Iditarod Trail Sled Dog, which ultimately forced six mushers to quit the same day, now has seen three mushers punished for sheltering their dogs instead of leaving them outside in the harsh conditions.

Mille Porsild of Denmark, Michelle Phillips of Canada and Riley Dyche of Fairbanks were penalized for taking dogs inside shelter cabins to ride out the storm with winds so strong, they whipped up white-out conditions, the Anchorage Daily News reported Friday.

Continue reading...

‘Life on hard mode’: the first out trans woman competing in the Iditarod

Iñupiaq musher Apayauq Reitan is poised to make history – but circumstances were very different when she faced Rosebud Summit three years ago

The snow was blowing sideways as the blizzard engulfed Rosebud Summit. Alone with her dog team more than 3,500ft up in Alaska’s forbidding White Mountains, then 21-year-old musher Apayauq Reitan struggled to find the trail during the 2019 Yukon Quest.

“The only way for me to tell where it was was by walking in front of the team and sinking into the snow up to my hips,” said Reitan.

Continue reading...

Cyclist fends off 500lb bear after getting bitten in Alaska

Man said he yelled at and kicked the animal as it charged him along a riverbed before it retreated

A cyclist confronted and bitten by a 500lb bear while out riding in Alaska told authorities he yelled at and kicked the animal as it ran after him, along a riverbed.

The incident last Tuesday occurred in Cantwell, close to the intersection between the Jack and Nenana rivers, the Alaska department of public safety said.

Continue reading...

Woolly mammoth walked far enough to circle Earth twice, study finds

Research into life of Kik adds weight to theory that climate change could have contributed to species’ demise

He was huge, hairy and boasted two enormous tusks: researchers say they have discovered a woolly mammoth called Kik who traipsed almost far enough in his life to circle the Earth twice.

Experts say the work not only sheds light on the movements of the giant proboscideans, but adds weight to ideas that climate change or human activity may have contributed to the demise of most of the creatures about 12,000 years ago.

Continue reading...

Pentagon chief ‘deeply concerned’ by sharp rise in suicides among US troops

Defense department promises improvements in quality of life and mental health help on army bases

The defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, has expressed concern about the alarming spike in suicides among US forces.

In 2020, 385 active-duty soldiers died by suicide, marking a steep increase from the 326 cases reported by the Pentagon in 2018.

Continue reading...

‘The bear came out of nowhere’: Alaska prospector on terrifying grizzly attack

Richard Jessee, who was searching for gold, said: ‘There was no doubt about it: the bear was trying to get into my cabin’

An Alaska gold prospector rescued from a sustained attack by a grizzly bear some compared to a famous scene in the movie The Revenant told a local newspaper: “The bear came out of nowhere.

“It rolled my bike and the trailer over like it was a toy car. I was in shock and hypothermic.”

Continue reading...

Man who endured weeklong attacks by grizzly bear rescued after SOS spotted

Alaska man injured by bear that kept returning to his isolated hut in the wilderness

It reads like the plot of a thriller movie or page-turning novel.

A man in Alaska was rescued, injured but alive, after enduring repeated attacks by a grizzly bear that kept on returning to his isolated hut in the wilderness, from which he had no way of contacting the outside world.

Continue reading...

Sixty wildfires rage across 10 US states – including blaze bigger than Portland

Thousands have been forced to evacuate from Alaska to Wyoming amid soaring temperatures and a drought

Nearly 60 wildfires were burning across 10 states in the parched American west on Tuesday, with the largest, in Oregon, consuming an area nearly twice the size of Portland.

The fires have torched homes and forced thousands to evacuate from Alaska to Wyoming, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Arizona, Idaho and Montana accounted for more than half of the large active fires.

Continue reading...

Covid cases fall across US but experts warn of dangers of vaccine hesitancy

Health experts emphasize need for even those who have had disease to get inoculated

New cases of Covid-19 are declining across most of the US, even in some states with vaccine-hesitant populations.

But almost all states where cases are rising have lower-than-average vaccination rates and experts warned on Sunday that relief from the coronavirus pandemic could be fleeting in regions where few people get inoculated.

Continue reading...

Czech Republic’s richest man dies in Alaska helicopter crash

Billionaire Petr Kellner among five killed including guests, pilot and guides, with one survivor

Petr Kellner, the Czech Republic’s richest man, was one of five people killed when their helicopter crashed on a skiing trip in Alaska.

The 56-year-old was among the passengers and pilot killed on Saturday in the crash near Knik glacier north-east of Anchorage, Alaska state troopers said. One survivor was taken to hospital, they said, adding the group had been on a heliski tour.

Continue reading...

‘Something bit my butt’: Alaska woman using outhouse attacked by bear

Shannon Stevens was treated with first aid kit after incident in which bear face was seen at at toilet seat level

An Alaska woman had the scare of a lifetime when using an outhouse in the backcountry and she was attacked by a bear, from below.

“I got out there and sat down on the toilet and immediately something bit my butt right as I sat down,” Shannon Stevens told the Associated Press. “I jumped up and I screamed when it happened.”

Continue reading...

Alaskan tribes, activists and businesses sue to save America’s biggest national forest

Tongass national forest, which plays a key role in fighting climate crisis, poised for logging after US ruling


A coalition of Alaskan native tribes, conservation groups and small businesses have filed a lawsuit in an effort to save America’s largest national forest by overturning one of the Trump administration’s most contentious environmental rollbacks.

Protection for the Tongass national forest in Alaska, one of the world’s last intact temperate rainforests, which plays a crucial role in fighting climate change, has been gutted by a recent US government decision to overturn a two-decade ban on logging and road building.

Continue reading...

‘Jet fighter’ godwit breaks world record for non-stop bird flight

Bar-tailed godwit flies more than 12,000km from Alaska to New Zealand in 11 days

A bird said to have the aerodynamic build of a “jet fighter” has been tracked flying more than 12,000km (7,500 miles) from Alaska to New Zealand, setting a new world record for avian non-stop flight.

The bar-tailed godwit set off from south-west Alaska on 16 September and arrived in a bay near Auckland 11 days later, having flown at speeds of up to 55mph.

Continue reading...