Stebbins residents banded together to fight fast-moving fire that destroyed their school

STEBBINS — Gov. Mike Dunleavy has declared a state of natural disaster in the Norton Sound community of Stebbins, where the local school and several outlying buildings were destroyed in a fire Wednesday.

Alaska State Troopers said no injuries or deaths have been reported from the fire.

On Thursday in Stebbins, the smell of burning rubber filled the air as residents looked over what was left of their only school. The acrid odor wafted from piles of dirt on the north side of the ruins, where red rubber mulch once sat beneath the school’s playground. The melted remains of a metal jungle gym protruded from the pile as still-burning embers glowed in the background.

The school is a total loss. Eight neighboring buildings were also destroyed in a fire which broke out around 4 p.m. on Wednesday. The fire broke out in a store adjacent to the school where an old boiler was located. The fire then spread to a nearby welding workshop.

Stebbins resident George Dan said he received a text from a friend around 5 p.m. Wednesday that simply said, “The school is on fire.” Still in flip-flops, Dan grabbed a thick Carhartt jacket and jumped on his four-wheeler. The Stebbins school graduate didn’t hesitate to join the effort to save the structure.

“I just wanted to be there to help, just trying to do my best and be part of the team that was there,” Dan said. “I literally grew up in this building, I have so many memories and it’s a tragedy that it’s lost. Everyone tried, the whole community, they all did their best. »

Dan said he desperately stuck his thumb into the end of a long hose to increase the reach of the low-pressure water line, lifted his heavy jacket to insulate his face from the extreme heat. Sometimes, he said, he doused himself with water to keep him going a little longer.

Extremely hot temperatures caused the wood siding at Stebbins School to catch fire. Within an hour, shifting winds spread the fire from the north to the south side of the building. Residents formed a bucket brigade from nearby Norton Sound and threw water on the school.

As the local response unfolded, volunteer firefighters from the Nome Fire Department, 116 miles to the north, rushed to help. They sent eight firefighters, hoses, water hookups and a water pump. The first crew arrived around 8:45 p.m. Wednesday, and a second crew arrived around 9:15 p.m. The crews quickly got to work, setting up a water pump in the seawater.

As the fire continued to spread, local construction company Tapraq Rock used bulldozers and loaders to push two almost new mobile classroom buildings into the burning school. Dustin Scalisi, director of Tapraq Rock, helped the community make what he called a “bold” decision.

“We said, ‘Okay, school’s out,’ now we have to save the cell phones,” Scalisi said. “Then we said, 'Mobiles are over, now we have to save the rest,' and that's when we took bold steps and started pulling out all the stops. »

Tapraq's team moved huge amounts of earth to establish a perimeter. In coordination with the Nome Fire Department, they were able to prevent further spread. By 2 a.m. Thursday, the fire — and the school it incinerated — was reduced to a smoky pile of wooden beams and sheet metal.

As Stebbins residents struggle with the aftermath of the fire, community leaders have come together to illuminate a path forward. More than 30 people gathered in Tapraq Rock's office where its employees, along with representatives from Stebbins and the Bering Strait School District, listened intently as City Administrator Daisy Katcheak opened the meeting.

“Right now I see 102 homes that are without electricity and heat. I worry about their freezers and the children who are relying on nebulizers and oxygen for the elderly,” Katcheak said.

Representatives from the regional nonprofit Kawerak and the neighboring village of St. Michael joined the meeting by telephone. Katcheak outlined his needs for the community and requested Kawerak's help with fuel deliveries to keep the generators running. The nonprofit provided advice on the joint resolution Stebbins was drafting with the neighboring village of St. Michael to request a disaster declaration in Dunleavy.

The declaration makes the village eligible for reimbursement for a number of recovery projects. In the joint application, Stebbins officials requested funding for road improvements from Stebbins to St. Michael in case students need to travel there to attend school.

School district maintenance director Gary Eckenweiler traveled to Stebbins to assess the situation. He released an estimate of how long it would take for students to return to a new school.

“Stebbins will build a new school. It will take a minimum of three years,” Eckenweiler said. “That’s really the only good thing in this whole thing.”

A meeting will be held Friday between Stebbins officials and district administrators to discuss the path forward. According to Eckenweiler, no option will be ruled out.

“At tomorrow’s meeting, we’re going to present all the potential ideas for how we can get school up and running in August, and then we’ll start narrowing those ideas down to the good ones,” Eckenweiler said.

Stebbins does not have a fire department, prompting an air response from Nome. Many at the meeting expressed frustration at the precious hours lost trying to fight the fire with insufficient resources.

Katcheak, the city administrator, said she had been walking the city all night to support her community. She said she didn't sleep until 8 a.m. Thursday and after less than two hours of rest, she went back to work.

Katcheak led the community through Typhoon Merbok in 2022, the destruction of the village's only grocery store in a fire two months later, and now Wednesday's fire. Reflecting on her turbulent tenure, she said she feels assured that her place as a leader in this community is where it is meant to be.

“I had to cry away from people,” Katcheak said, remembering the night of the fire, fighting back tears. “I was asking God for something, and he kept coming to encourage me. And I said, ‘God, is this what I’m supposed to do?’”