“We’re gonna have to start over,' said Chevak resident Ryan Bukowski, who lost a summer of subsistence harvest to a power outage after last weekend's storm. 'I don’t know how we’re gonna do it, but we’re gonna have to figure out something fast.”
September 23, 2022
“I was hoping to go moose hunting but unfortunately this storm hit us here, so I can’t use my boat and motor,” said Derek Knight. He was at the Chevak community building this week to report his losses to the local tribe, which plans to seek disaster relief funds from the state and federal government.
Losing this summer’s fish is already painful, but with their boats lost locals are unable to replace that with moose or seals they would hunt in the fall. Knight and others say nearly 90 percent of the 100 or so boats people use to gather food were damaged or completely destroyed by the storm. Many of the damaged boats lying along the riverbank now look like dented soda cans. They’re tangled up in fishing nets. There are pieces of lumber and broken sheets of plywood all over the place. There are bottles, soda cans, round orange fishing floats and overturned gas cans everywhere, and there’s a strong smell of gasoline and oil.
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