Unalaska, AK – The Unalaska City Council is far from agreement on several changes to how it holds meetings. That was the take-home message of Thursday's work session, the first in the council's tentative new meeting format, in which council members debated a raft of procedural changes that they supposedly agreed upon at the council's December 30 workshop.

A letter circulated by Mayor Shirley Marquardt summarizing the changes implied that the five council members who were at the workshop were in agreement on them. But as the discussion progressed, it became clear that council agreed on hardly any of them, a situation that perplexed council member Juanita Lewis.

Unalaska, AK – Response crews worked yesterday to contain a minor chemical spill on an American President Lines container ship in Dutch Harbor.

Personnel from APL, the Department of Public Safety and the U.S. Coast Guard responded to a chemical leak Wednesday afternoon onboard the APL Chile, a foreign-flagged ship that docked in Dutch Harbor late Wednesday morning. The chemical ethylenediamine was found leaking from a container onboard the ship. The container was filled with 55-gallon drums of the material from Dow Chemical, at least one of which presumably opened and spilled during shipping.

Unalaska, AK – The Unalaska City Council will meet for a work session at 7 p.m. tonight. This is the council's first meeting under its new system in which regular meetings and work sessions are held on alternating weeks. It was originally scheduled for Tuesday but postponed on account of the weather.

On the agenda tonight are a return to the issue of metal and nets in Unalaska's landfill, as well as a review of the mayor's and council's travel policy and the council's fiscal year 2008 Congressional funding requests. They'll also review discussions and proposed changes from the council's workshop earlier this month.

Unalaska, AK – Fishermen reached an agreement on opilio crab prices with another processor today. The members of the Inter-Cooperative Exchange agreed to $1.50 a pound from UniSea Inc., according to negotiator Greg White. That's slightly lower than the price reached with Westward Seafoods, but White says UniSea sweetened the deal by offering the same price for northern processing in the Pribilof Islands, which is more expensive for processors and accordingly can mean a lower price for fishermen.

Unalaska, AK – A series of earthquakes shook Unalaska starting early this morning. The largest of them, with a magnitude of 5.3, happened at 1:01 a.m. about 55 miles southwest of the island. It was followed in the next half-hour by 16 smaller quakes, according to geologist Cindy Preller of the West Coast & Alaska Tsunami Warning Center in Palmer.

Geologists call this kind of seismic event a "swarm." The jolts were preceded by three smaller quakes on Friday and Sunday. The event was of too small a magnitude to do any damage in Unalaska.

Unalaska, AK – Unalaska shut down this afternoon in preparation for a storm that looks less and less likely as the afternoon rolls on. The National Weather Service initially anticipated winds hitting the island at up to 80 mph and still has a high wind warning in effect through midnight tonight, but the weather station at the Unalaska Airport reports that today's wind speeds haven't topped 45 mph.

Unalaska, AK – A few boats have started in on the 2007 opilio crab season in the Bering Sea, now that one processor has put up a price for crab.

Westward Seafoods is offering $1.525 a pound for A shares, although agreements haven't been reached on B and C shares yet, according to Greg White, who negotiates prices for the Inter-Cooperative Exchange and represents about 70 percent of the Bering Sea crab fleet. White said that the price is a little short of what fishermen wanted, but it's still something they're willing to go to work for.

Unalaska, AK – Unalaska's honeymoon with winter appears to be over. After weeks of snow and occasional sunshine, the rain and wind returned Monday night and are closing down some services in town.

The wind was measured at speeds up to 45 mph at the airport this morning. The National Weather Service is expecting it to blow from the South at 50 to 60 mph later today, gusting as high as 80 mph. Forecasters have also issued a high winds warning for Unalaska extending to 5 a.m. Wednesday.

Unalaska, AK – Like most towns in southwest Alaska, Unalaska is hooked on fuel oil. The community is powered by diesel generators, and as fuel prices rise, this is becoming more of a problem. That's why city leaders are looking at harnessing the power of one of the community's oldest neighbors, Makushin Volcano. KIAL's Charles Homans reports.

(This story first aired on APRN's "AK" program on January 6.)