As Alaska’s rivers begin serving as winter roads and trails, a new study from the University of Alaska Fairbanks helps explain why certain stretches of water never seem to freeze. Researchers from UAF’s Water and Environmental Research Center, part of the Institute of Northern Engineering, conducted hydraulic modeling and analyzed a decade of satellite data […]
Walking a storm-scoured Alaska beach, archaeologist Rick Knecht knelt to pick up a wooden figurine the size of his palm. He squinted at it and identified the piece as a doll that might have belonged to a little girl, one who had lived and died there centuries before. He handed it to Alice Bailey, who […]
Just when you thought you’d seen everything in the boreal forest, a reader points out white whiskers sprouting from the ground. Chris Greenfield-Pastro of Fairbanks sent in photos of what she called “hair ice” blooming from the forest floor behind her house. In her images, delicate white lashes of ice curve from woody debris and […]
A circular scar on Alaska’s face speaks to an event that may have contributed to the fall of societies on the far side of the world. Two thousand years ago, Alaska’s Mount Okmok volcano spewed ash high into the atmosphere, for months. Today, a crater 6 miles from rim to rim marks ground zero on […]