A cabin on Chilkat Lake is pictured in the aftermath of a heavy windstorm Monday. Blowdowns caused significant damage to several structures on the lake earlier this week.
A violent windstorm swept across Chilkat Lake on Monday, damaging several cabins and nearly crushing a resident napping in his home.
According to a neighbor, the resident was asleep when a large tree fell on his cabin, fully severing his bedroom from the structure’s main A frame. The resident, who could not be reached for comment by press time, did not sustain serious injuries, according to the neighbor.
Chilkat Lake resident Mike Simpson said the worst of the storm and damage occurred near the narrows and little lake, at the southern end of Chilkat Lake. At least three cabins suffered severe damage, including one that partially slid into the lake.
“The residents at the scene described it to be like ‘little tornadoes’ that formed just after 3 p.m. (Monday),” said Simpson, who checked on neighbors and surveyed the damage from his jetboat. “As you’re going into the narrows, one cabin was completely demolished. … Pieces of it went down into the lake. You can see the remnants of it up the hill.”
Another cabin, in the main lake area, was crushed by a big blowdown, according to a photograph shared with the CVN. It wasn’t clear by press time who owns that property.
A large branch struck the roof of Ira and Alissa Henry’s cabin at the lake. Ira said he was unsure of the extent of damage and was planning to assess it Wednesday evening, after the CVN’s deadline.
Simpson said about 90% of the damage he saw was caused by blowdowns. “With all the rain we had, the soft ground, that high wind yesterday, it just didn’t take too much for them to come down,” Simpson said Tuesday.
The National Weather Service doesn’t measure wind data at Chilkat Lake. Kimberly Vaughan, a National Weather Service forecaster in Juneau, said without more information it’s hard to say exactly what weather phenomena occurred. The region doesn’t normally experience conditions that cause true tornadoes. Vaughan said more likely to occur here are williwaws, sudden squalls that form when winds come rushing down mountainsides.
There were also high winds around the borough Sunday. Mosquito Lake resident Jim Stanford said he observed up to 100 blowdowns between 27.5 and 33 Mile Haines Highway caused by “a really freak windstorm” Sunday.
Driving back from Fairbanks earlier in the day, he said he observed hurricane-force winds in the Yukon.
“The wind around Kluane Lake and Haines Junction was the worst I’ve ever seen, and I’ve spent a lot of time up there,” Stanford said.