Alix Soliman

3 weeks ago | ktoo.org | Alix Soliman

Listen to this story:https://media.ktoo.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/13WhaleStudy_WEB-ACTUALLY.mp3Pregnant and nursing humpback whales rely on the protected waters near Juneau to fatten up on herring and krill while raising their young. But calves were involved in nine of the 14 recorded incidents of whales getting entangled or hit by boats in the past four years.

3 weeks ago | alaskapublic.org | Alix Soliman

The Juneau Assembly voted Monday to extend the Mendenhall River levee meant to protect Valley homes from annual glacial outburst floods. This comes after new inundation maps were released last week, showing how the levee should work. The HESCO barriers were initially set to stop at Rivercourt Way. But if a future flood is larger than last year’s 16-foot event, the new maps show downstream infrastructure could be saturated, including two schools, a library, a post office and Safeway.

3 weeks ago | ktoo.org | Alix Soliman

The Juneau Assembly voted Monday to extend the Mendenhall River levee meant to protect Valley homes from annual glacial outburst floods. This comes after new inundation maps were released last week, showing how the levee should work. The HESCO barriers were initially set to stop at Rivercourt Way. But if a future flood is larger than last year’s 16-foot event, the new maps show downstream infrastructure could be saturated, including two schools, a library, a post office and Safeway.

1 month ago | ktoo.org | Alix Soliman

Flood inundation maps that model how Juneau’s Mendenhall River levee should perform have finally arrived, and there’s a lot of information to wade through. The maps show that the levee would protect Mendenhall Valley residents against a flood of the same 16-foot magnitude as last year. Deputy City Manager Robert Barr said the levee built from HESCO barriers would effectively push water into a western floodplain where nobody lives.

1 month ago | ktoo.org | Alix Soliman

A lawsuit originally aimed at stopping the construction of flood barriers along Mendenhall River has shifted its goals. The plaintiffs now say they want the city to pay them for building the levee on their land.  The shift comes after a judge denied a motion to halt construction of the levee meant to protect hundreds of homes in Mendenhall Valley from annual glacial outburst flooding because doing so would be against the public interest. Another homeowner has also joined the case.