A faulty sensor was likely to blame for the hour-long power outage on Friday morning, according to Public Utilities Director Dan Winters. 

The recently installed CAT C280 engine had a ‘high crank case pressure’ alarm that tripped the system, shutting down the engine.  The total grid load at that point exceeded the generating capacity of the two smaller CAT engines, causing them to shut down as well.

After travel delays, the Unalaska Boys and Girls basketball teams made it to Bethel yesterday to compete in the Donlin Gold Classic tournament.

The boys team put up a tough fight against the Bethel Warriors last night, ultimately losing the match 39 to 43. However, the Raiders did rally during the fourth quarter, shrinking Bethel’s 16-point lead to just four points in the final minutes of the game. JJ Fernandez was the Raiders’ top scorer, with 13 points.

The City of Unalaska is finally moving ahead with construction of its new wastewater treatment plant. 

At Tuesday night’s Council meeting, councilors voted unanimously to award an engineering and design contract for Phase I of the project to Bristol Engineering Services Corporation.

Councilor Dennis Robinson noted the contract was somewhat unusual.

“I just wanted to state that I don’t particularly like the idea of giving contracts out to indiv[uals] or to anybody without going out to bid, but I think in this specific instance it’s warranted.”

For the past two years, western Pacific gray whales have been tracked making an unusual journey across the Aleutian Chain. The endangered marine mammals have started their journey from Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East, traveled across the Bering Sea during the summertime, and then moved down to the California coast to breed. Now, scientists are saying that it’s possible that the tagged creatures might not be western Pacific gray whales after all.

Rapidly advancing sea ice has left crabbers scrambling to get their gear out of the water or stuck in port, waiting for better weather. 

As soon as Mark Casto got into port on Tuesday, he was already getting ready to head back out.  He’s captain of the crabber Pinnacle. With the ice coming down rapidly, he’s worried about the two hundred pots he still has in the water.

“It’s just finding them again, if you can find them.”

The Bering Sea’s biggest fishery is open once again.

KUCB’s Alexandra Gutierrez has this story  on the pollock fleet’s expectations for A season.

A 32-year-old man is being extradited from Unalaska to California on outstanding burglary charges.

Steven Brown, age 32, was on the F/V Glacier Bay when he was apprehended on Thursday night, after the Unalaska Department of Public Safety received information from an investigator that Brown was a “fugitive from justice” and that there was a warrant out for his arrest. The warrant does not provide any information on the nature of the burglary, but it did state that Brown had failed to appear before the State of California’s court system on this charge.

Last year, Vladivostok Air announced that it would be flying passenger planes from Alaska to the Russian Far East during the summer season. Now, the airline has finalized its schedule and is preparing for a July 12 launch date.

Currently, you have to fly down to Seattle and through Beijing, Tokyo, or Moscow if you want to get to Kamchatka. It’s an expensive and time-consuming process, especially given the peninsula’s proximity to Alaska. Mark Dudley is the North American sales manager for Vladivostok, and he says that their weekly summer service should make it easier for travelers to get to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky.

The local newspapers for the Unalaska and Bristol Bay regions are coming back into publication starting next month. However, the 2 papers are being combined into one publication.

Before publication ceased last year the Bristol Bay Times and the Dutch Harbor Fishermen were separate newspapers but the new publisher is combining the papers into one paper and hopes to begin printing the papers early next month.