Two four-wheelers carrying five men leaving Bethel broke through needle ice on the upper end of Church Slough on Sunday night. Two of the men died, while three others were treated for hypothermia in Bethel.
Travelers need to stay off Straight Slough, which flows into the main Kuskokwim River near Bethel.
“It got very cold the day we got there, it got down to like single digits and ice came out of the mountains and rivers and sloughs everywhere,” said Allyn Long, general manager of Alaska Logistics.
Drivers need to stick to marked trails on the Lower Kuskokwim River, according to the latest update from Bethel Search and Rescue’s Earl Samuelson. There is a spot in front of Oscarville that has only 9 inches of ice, which Samuelson says is too thin to drive a truck on.
Napakiak doesn’t have a boat landing anymore. Storms over the past week ate huge chunks from the Kuskokwim riverbank close to the city school and fuel
The river is so rough in the Upper Kuskokwim area that it is impassable to vehicle and snow machine traffic. Big boulders of snow-covered ice are scattered across the river caused by high water and a late freeze up.
The ice road on the frozen Kuskokwim River has been plowed to its longest length ever: 355 miles. That’s longer than most traditional highways in the state.
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