UAF in the news: Week of March 6, 2006

Submitted by Marmian Grimes
Phone: (907) 474-7902
03/10/06

Pressure building inside volcano
Anchorage Daily News and similar stories at various other print and television locations statewide
HOMER--After subsiding for weeks, pressure inside Augustine Volcano has started to build up again, scientists said this week. The likeliest explanation is that the mountain’s new lava dome--which has raised the elevation of the island peak by several hundred feet--is sealing off vents in the volcano, trapping volcanic gas. Read more ...

Nanooks Make A Home, Half A World Away
The Observer/Notre Dame
SOUTH BEND, Ind.-- This road trip has had a little more to offer Alaska-Fairbanks than its typical 3,500 mile treks. In all the Nanooks will have dealt with two consecutive weekends of cutthroat hockey, nearly two weeks in a South Bend hotel, a majority of the team falling ill and even the supernatural. Read more ...

Kriers chosen as Pioneers of Alaska regents
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
It took relatives in Fairbanks almost a decade to lure Jerry and Donna Krier up the Alaska Highway, but once the young family arrived in town from Wisconsin in 1959, they never looked back. Read more ...

Togiak dancers wow students
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Monica Chi’s kindergartners perked up when they heard the opening beats of "The Igloo Song."
They’d been learning the Inupiat song and dance in class at Joy Elementary School. Soon the youngsters were chopping imaginary snow blocks and stacking them into a snow house, right along with the Imarpigmiut Dancers from Togiak. Read more ...

The governor’s oil tax plan needs a little improvement
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
The Legislature is poised to decide the fate of the petroleum production tax, which will replace the current severance tax. The governor’s proposal will provide a 20 percent tax rate on net profits with a 20 percent deduction on capital expenditures. This is a tax on profits after costs and royalties are removed. Read more ...

UAF puts Iditarod Trail on desktop
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Fans of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race who long to see the trail don’t have to leave home to view the race thanks to a virtual animation program created at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Read more ...

Bird watchers get windfall
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Bird professor Kevin Winker has seen grant money come and go, but until this year he had never witnessed the federal government dump millions into bird watching.
But with the spring migration season beginning this month and a fear of the potential spread of bird flu, the federal government has put more than $3.5 million into a surveillance program to be conducted this spring, summer and fall in Alaska. Read more ...

Augustine to be monitored by submarine seismometers
Homer News
Five Ocean Bottom Seismometers, or OBS, were deployed Feb. 9, 2006, off Augustine Island to assist the Alaska Volcano Observatory in its monitoring effort of volcanic activity on the island. Read more ...

"Flatfish" to join "Shrimp Hawks" at national ocean science competition
SITNews
"ÂWhen February avalanches closed the only road to Seward, Alaska, the Cordova High School team "Flatfish" found themselves floundering on the wrong side of the snow slide and unable to finish a regional marine science competition for which they had spent months preparing. Read more ...

Web mushing
Anchorage Press
Iditarod fans can follow their favorite mushers online now, using a computer application developed at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Read more ...