Author: kfskadmin

Local police today are investigating the death of Bradley Fletcher, a 24-year-old Petersburg man.

A city manager firing, city council arguments, lawsuits and landslides were some of the biggest news stories of 2009 in Petersburg. Hydro-electric power development and work at Petersburg's airport were also among the top headlines of the year.

On their late-fall research trip to study humpback whale and krill interactions in Seymour Canal, researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made some exceptionally clear recordings of individual whale songs. KFSK Public Radio played some of these recordings for wildlife biologist Chris Gabriele. She leads an underwater acoustic monitoring program at Glacier Bay National Park and she studies whale vocalizations. Matt Lichtenstein asked Gabriele about the Seymour whale songs

Returns of chum salmon to Southeast Alaska’s largest hatchery facilities next year may not keep pace with 2009’s crop. Hatchery managers say they’re forecasting a drop-off in chum numbers around the region.

Petersburg’s Rotary Club has raised enough money to start up a revolving loan fund in Africa, in honor of a Tanzanian school teacher who died while visiting here one year ago. Eden and Rogathe Kaombwe spent a month in Petersburg and Juneau last winter, telling about their lives in Monduli in northeastern Tanzania. Eden died of an apparent heart attack while in Petersburg in early January. His widow, Rogathe, returned to Tanzania and in the past year has helped start up a Rotary club in the area. Petersburg’s club is partnering with that club and has enlisted the help of a non-governmental organization that works in the area, to create a new system for loaning money to business people. A recent fund raising effort netted a little over $2,000 from local residents, along with a contribution from the Lutheran church. The Petersburg Rotary Club also put in $5,000 and that local money will be matched, two-to-one, by the Rotary district organization, giving the Monduli revolving loan fund about $22,000. Joe Viechnicki spoke with local rotary club board member Dave Berg about the revolving loan fund and how it will work.