Top Alaska public safety stories of 2025: Typhoon Halong, crime and immigration enforcement
- Alaska Beacon
- Dec 31
- 4 min read
By Corrine Smith
Alaska Beacon
Alaska dealt with a range of public safety challenges and policy choices in 2025, from extreme weather to immigration enforcement.
The devastation left by Typhoon Halong in Western Alaska was historic — and life-changing for many — this year. The storms prompted a massive disaster response and public safety effort, including the largest mass evacuation in state history.
Gov. Dunleavy joined other Republican governors and approved the Trump administration’s request to deploy Alaska National Guard service members domestically for “civil disturbance operations” in Washington D.C. , and 100 service members are set to deploy in March.
The Dunleavy administration also agreed to detain 42 men arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from out of state in June, amid a nationwide immigration crackdown. The move, and subsequent transfer of detainees back to Washington state, raised questions and concerns from lawmakers and advocates around why they were transferred to Alaska and conditions in Alaska prisons.
This year, University of Alaska researchers told lawmakers that policy to mitigate crime should focus on violent crime because according to the most recently available crime data for 2023, violent crime rates remained “exceptionally” high, even though Alaska’s property crime was declining.
Here are some of the top stories of the year:
The remnants of Typhoon Halong caused massive storm surge and hurricane force winds that devastated coastal communities, particularly in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta region, and prompted the largest mass evacuation from Western Alaska in state history.
The catastrophic storm left one person dead and two more missing. Dozens of homes floated off their foundations, communities across the region sustained damage, and existential questions arose around the region’s future because of intensifying climate change factors that amplify environmental risks.
The Alaska Beacon was on the ground in Bethel at the time the storm hit, and documented the first evacuation flights as hundreds of residents from Kipnuk and Kwigilingok boarded Alaska National Guard flights from the National Guard Armory in Bethel to Anchorage.
Maj. Gen. Torrence Saxe, commissioner of the Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, which oversees the Alaska National Guard said this was the largest off-the-road-system response for the National Guard in his 45-year career in the state.
Officials with the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management put the process of repairs and debris clean up on pause for winter. The state’s disaster response effort will pick up in the spring in coordination with federal agencies, regional tribal organizations, non-profits and local partners.. Both state and federal disaster assistance program application periods have been extended to February 2026, to allow more time for residents to apply for relief.
The total cost of the storm damage is still unknown, and the Western Alaska region faces a long road to recovery.
Gov. Dunleavy approved a request from the Trump administration to deploy 100 Alaska National Guard service members to Washington D.C in March of 2026.
Days prior to the announcement, lawmakers raised concerns about the Pentagon directive to the Alaska National Guard to prepare a quick response force for “civil disturbance operations” in American cities.
Service members are directed to train for crowd control and to quell civil unrest. Officials with the Dunleavy administration said the Alaska National Guard is preparing such a force to align with national level requirements.
Researchers with the University of Alaska Anchorage told lawmakers that policy to address crime should focus on violent crime, as the most recent data available shows that even though Alaska property crime was declining, violent crime rates remained “exceptionally” high.
According to 2023 data, the most recent year available, Alaska’s violent crime rate was 5.4 times the national rate, at 1,975.2 per 100,000 residents, dominated by aggravated assaults. That includes reported crimes, and actual prevalence of crime incidence is likely much higher, researchers said.
“Alaska’s crime problem is really a violent crime problem,” Brad Myrstol, a professor with the UAA Justice Center at the University and director of the Alaska Justice Information Center told lawmakers in February. “If you want to understand crime in Alaska, you might want to look at violent crime first.”
The Dunleavy administration approved the transfer of 42 men arrested in other states by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement into Alaska’s correctional facilities. The men were detained at the Anchorage Correctional Complex for several weeks in June.
Officials said the transfer was part of an ongoing agreement between the Alaska Department of Corrections and the U.S. Department of Justice, intended to alleviate overcrowding in the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington. The Alaska House Judiciary Committee held a fact-finding hearing where lawmakers and advocates raised concerns about the state’s agreement with federal law enforcement — and conditions within the Anchorage jail after reports of a pepper spray incident, use of criminal lockdown, and lack of access to medical care, attorneys, and translation services.
Advocates with the ACLU of Alaska reported that Alaska saw a significant increase in immigration arrests in Alaska this year. The organization tracked at least 70 arrests, a nearly 500% increase over last year.
Officials grappled with the rising number of deaths in Alaska jails and prisons. The Alaska Department of Corrections reported a record-tying 18 deaths in custody this year.
There have been at least 84 deaths in custody since 2020, which some lawmakers and advocates say is preventable. They are calling for the reinstatement of an independent oversight body to investigate deaths and provide recommendations for prevention.
State corrections and medical officials testified to the Legislature in the spring that a higher number of deaths are attributed to natural causes within an aging prison population. Several incidents of alleged medical neglect and suicide in recent years prompted families to file wrongful death lawsuits against the department.
• Corinne Smith started reporting in Alaska in 2020, serving as a radio reporter for several local stations across the state including in Petersburg, Haines, Homer and Dillingham. She spent two summers covering the Bristol Bay fishing season. Originally from Oakland, California, she got her start as a reporter, then morning show producer, at KPFA Radio in Berkeley. Alaska Beacon is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
