The ash cloud from the remote volcano was detected in satellite data and was big enough for the National Weather Service to issue a warning for aircraft up to 20,000 feet above sea level.
The cold and wet hunters built a fire to keep warm until Alaska Army National Guard rescuers arrived hours later.
Transportation engineers moved the road to avoid a giant mass of frozen debris sliding downhill.
DOT spokesperson Shannon McCarthy said the weather this week -- alternately freezing and thawing -- was likely the culprit.
Authorities warned that drivers should use caution in the area due to the potential for additional rockslides.
Exhaust emissions from a Norwegian Cruise Line vessel docking in Juneau prompted at least 10 complaints to an Alaska regulatory agency.
The highway closed after rocks covered the northbound lane at mile 111, near McHugh Creek. A second rock slide was reported near mile 106.5.
Winds of up to 85 mph ripped up the Southwest Alaska coast on Friday, upending smokehouses, tearing electric lines and flinging a house across the road.
A September storm caused damage in Utqiagvik, and Gov. Bill Walker declared a disaster there last month.
A new study estimates that climate impacts to public infrastructure in Alaska will total about $5 billion by century's end.
Temperatures in the area were unseasonably high last week, reaching into the mid-40s, according to the National Weather Service. Then temperatures dropped below freezing Sunday and into Monday morning. "There's a lot of water flowing underground in this area," McCarthy said. The freeze-thaw "caused some instability and that made it slide."
Previously, the dredging started around May and ran through October, but the past three winters it has started earlier and run longer.
At least 50,000 homes and businesses lost power late Tuesday, and outages continued through Wednesday.
There has been an outbreak in Fairbanks of the amber-marked birch leaf miner (Profenusa thomsoni), an insect that came to North America in the early 1900s and arrived in Fairbanks by about 2002.
A woman was trapped in a pickup on the Seward Highway on Friday after falling ice crushed the vehicle just south of Anchorage.
Gusts over 80 mph pummeled the city, compacting snow and causing power outages for thousands. Nearly 20,000 Matanuska Electric Association members lost power Friday morning. On Point MacKenzie west of Wasilla, crews faced snow drifts so large that they needed snowmachines and snowshoes to reach areas where repairs were needed.
In the village of about 400, outgoing winter ice dams triggered flooding tha shut down the low-lying runway for 11 days.
Chile’s president says intense forest fires burning around a densely populated area of central Chile have caused at least 46 deaths, and officials say at least 1,100 homes had been destroyed.
At least 36 ships will skip scheduled stops in Skagway this summer because the cruise dock closed after a landslide sent debris toppling from the mountain above.
The McCarthy Road was closed between Mile 0 and 1 in Chitina on Monday, June 3, 2024, after a portion of the road sank. The transportation department is still assessing the cause of the road settlement, Perreault said, but it is not river washout or a landslide.
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