Power has been restored in Akiak after a malfunctioning generator led to five days of near-total power outages in the lower Kuskokwim River village.
Aleck Jackson, a temporary city administrator, said that power was restored to the whole community as of May 26, though Akiak is still relying on a single working generator. Two other generators at the community power plant remain out of service.
Roughly half the homes in the community of around 450 people relied on personal generators during the outages, and Jackson said these needed to be powered down to get power fully restored.
“They had restored power to half the village and the other half couldn't couldn't get power because people were using their personal generators, so they had to unplug them for the rest of Akiak to get power,” Jackson said. “Those generators kept tripping the generator at the power plant.”
Jackson said that he has not heard reports from the community of any loss of frozen food stores due to the outages. He said that the community’s piped water system is also back online after being shut down last week by the electrical outages.
To address the significant amount of fuel used to power personal generators, the local Native corporation donated a roughly one month supply of fuel to the city, according to the Alaska Division of Community and Regional Affairs.
According to Jeremy Zidek, a spokesperson with the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, the state is exploring options for getting additional fuel to Akiak.
