Despite Multimillion Dollar Sea Wall, Most Alaskan Villagers Flee Storm's Impact - ADN

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The northwest coastal village of Kivalina was largely empty Thursday as wind, rain and crashing waves chased away most residents and raised fears that a year-old, multimillion-dollar sea wall wouldn't keep the Chukchi Sea at bay. Fewer than 50 of the town's 330 people were left in the Inupiat community, most of them men working round the clock with heavy equipment to add 3,600-pound sandbags to the faulty seawall.

"The weather has turned for the worst," Mayor Austin Swan said Thursday afternoon as the storm built. Weary from a night-long evacuation, Swan looked out his office window and said he could see whitecaps on the village lagoon -- a sure sign that wind gusts reaching 50 mph had found land. Late afternoon brought more concern as winds switched from the southeast to the south, meaning they were coming right off the ocean. "They will definitely be pushing straight onto the beach," Swan said. Sustained winds of 30 mph continued through the night.

With most villagers safely away -- 132 found shelter at the Red Dog Mine, about 117 flew to Kotzebue and 18 boated to inland fishing and hunting camps -- the biggest fear was whether the seawall would do its job. A whole row of sandbags was lost to the Chukchi late Wednesday night, Swan said, and the supply of those being used to fortify the wall was dwindling. Only about 100 sacks were left, he said, although more were on the way from Alaska Interstate Construction of Anchorage, which rounded up more than 400, and the Army Corps of Engineers, which planned to send several hundred.

Kivalina has lost more than 100 feet of coastline in the past three years to waves and storm surges. Construction of a 1,800-foot seawall was completed last year for $3 million, but villagers said it has failed to protect the town.

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http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/rural/story/9301473p-9215961c.html