The August 18th landslide claimed three lives, destroyed property, and catalyzed a massive response effort by the city, the state, and the local community. (Mike Hicks/KCAW photo)

Today (08-16-16) is the one-year-anniversary of the August 18th landslide in Sitka. The slide claimed three lives, destroyed property, and catalyzed a massive response effort by the city, the state, and the local community. Many in Sitka volunteered food, shelter, and sweat to the recovery effort. And amid these gestures of aid, one of the most healing agents in the week that followed was words.

Downloadable audio.

In Part four of our five part series today, we want to share some of those words with you. We begin with Peter Bradley, Director of the Island Institute, who compiled a series of Facebook posts written that week in a book called “Notes from the Landslide.”

Peter Bradley: Like many people, I felt helpless in the face of of the loss, uncertainty, and devastation that the landslides brought. I donated a small amount of money to a couple of the funds, called the fire department to see if I could help, and then resigned myself to waiting, watching listening. All the same, I found something to be hopeful about. I was drawn to Sitka Chatters – a Facebook group with a few thousand local members – as a microcosm of the spirit of the community.

Samantha Cox: August 18th at 4:42 p.m. Please list below all homes that folks may evacuate to.

I can stay with a friend, so my whole house is open. One king sized bed and a couch.
Charteris has room.
Pets and kids welcome.
We could take a family of four to six.
We do have cats and rabbits and kids.
My home is very small, but I can offer food, blankets…
Dios este con todos ustedes, me uno a su dolor desde Aca, Mexico.
Reading all these comments is making me cry all the way down here in Florida.

Keith Perkins: August 20th at 3:50 p.m. Two of three Sitkans, the Diaz brothers, are now home. The effort continues to press on for William [Stortz]. The challenge of deep mud and debris will make it a hard one, yet I see the resolve in these volunteers. Closure is important and with this titanic effort by their friends, they are now home. For the families and for the friends, they are home. Together. There is one more Sitkan to bring home and that effort will continue. For now, I quietly smile at that thought that the Elmer and Uli personalities were loud and proud. Always smiling. Always doing. The fabulous Diaz brothers. Truly, their attitude towards life was an incredible one. Cheers to Elmer and Uli for being incredible friends to my sons and to never fearing life and always living it fully. Let’s bring William home.

Notes from the Landslide, published by the Island Institute, is a collection of news articles and web posts written after the landslide. (Emily Kwong/KCAW photo)

Sotera Perez: The date on this is August, 20th. In a town the size of Sitka, it’s easy to begin to believe that I know every last soul here. I don’t, though. I really only know what I call the 400. And it’s precisely those folks that I know. They drink their coffee in my shop. They buy their books at Old Harbor. And among them, there are a few – maybe, say, 35, maybe as high as 50 – who are the ones who present you with a can of freshly smoked salmon from a jacket pocket, or who wade knee-deep to help you hitch a boat when you’ve never done it before. They pull their work trucks up so you can haul a mattress. Feel comfortable correcting your misbehaving child. Call to tell you they like your show. Ask if you’ve read the latest. William Strotz was one of my 35. I could set a clock by him. Every weekday morning for many, many years, I’ve made him a double Americano at 7:30. When he worked at SEARHC, I refilled his cup at 7:50. When he moved to the city, I started doing it at 7:55. Some tiny, but important part of my life is absent. I’m grateful for my 400 people – and for your 400, overlapping mine, and for your neighbor’s, overlapping yours. These rippling circles on our town pond make us a community that set us apart from other places. What I know about William – apart from his love of strong coffee and scones with nuts in them – is that his love for his people, this rippling pond, was fierce and steady. Let’s throw some rocks for him and make the ripples bigger, okay? Thanks you guys, I love you.

Samantha Cox: Here’s the numbers. 30 people donated auction items. In total, the items and services were worth over $5000. In the days following the slide, Sitka Chatters gained 2000 more members from all over the country–all people who were concerned about what was happening here. The GoFundMe I set up (Sitka Chatters Emergency Fund) raised $14,000 in two weeks.

Peter Bradley: I’m thankful that in Sitka, every argument will have 9000 sides and every tragedy will have 9000 hearts. My hope is that, as we run into conflicts and try to find answers to difficult and divisive questions, we can remember the generosity, kindness, and shared spirit of community that we saw in the week of the landslide.

Keith Perkins: August 25th. The sunset tonight in Sitka…seven days from a horrific moment. The day of warm side. The day that Sitkans help bring our third friend home to his family. The day that marks closure. The day that begins a healing process  for the community. Maybe this sunset is William, Elmer, and Uli’s way of smiling at us all. It truly is Sitka being Sitka.

Click here to see a full digital copy of “Notes from the Landslide”

Over two dozen families were impacted by the Kramer Avenue landslide, many placed under evacuation and contending with flooding on their property. (Emily Kwong/KCAW photo)

The landslide that struck Sitka in August of last year was not the worst disaster to befall a community, but the impacts still echo. Kramer Avenue is less than three miles from downtown. And although only one home was wiped out, others sustained structural or water damage. Many were spared — almost by chance.

Downloadable audio.

Pete and Margie Esquiro have lived on Sand Dollar Drive for twelve years. The morning of the landslide, the rain was relentless. Pete had gone over to a neighbor’s. They were worried their house would flood. Margie was at home alone.

Margie Esquiro: There was a knock on the door and someone yelling, “Mrs. Esquiro, Mrs. Esquiro! You have to leave! You have to leave!” So I quickly threw some clothes on. Tried to call Pete but I couldn’t. So I jumped in the car and went down to where he was. And as I was leaving, there were police in the neighborhood with loud speakers. They were next door. I took nothing and left for a week. There’s at least 25 or 30 families in that general area that were impacted, either with having to evacuate or dealing with the mud or dealing with flood or things like that. I think some people are more anxious than others. Just depending. I don’t have a suitcase packed, but I thought about it. Maybe I should have a little bag packed.

Pete Esquiro: When you live between the mountains and the ocean, you always run the risk. If the ocean doesn’t get you, maybe the mountains might get you. We all live in a risk situation and our home is right at the place on the hillside where the slide turned before it got to us.

Margie Esquiro: We were right directly in the path before it filled up a gully — for lack of a better word — and come onto the Kramer road and the berm and made a turn. So had it continued on straight, it could have impacted us directly.

KCAW: So when you realized that the berm was what diverted the landslide away from your part of the neighborhood, how did you process that? What did you say to each other?

Margie Esquiro: Just looked at each and thought about moving. (Laughs) We had a moment or two. But I guess…I guess we’ll wait and see. We’ll wait and see what happens.

The area, known locally as the “Benchlands,” was under development when the landslide occurred. The city sold 20 acres to Sound Development LLC in 2013. (Mike Hicks/KCAW photo)

Ariel Starbuck lives on Halibut Point Road with her husband and two children, Cedar and Rosalie. They were 4 and 3 years old, respectively, when the landslide occurred.

Starbuck: The landslide happened on Tuesday (08-18-15). I had just finished gathering all the documents for the closing on our house on Thursday (08-13-15). The day of the landslide, I was standing at the window. I called my husband and said, ‘There is a river coming down the road next to us – Whale Watch Drive was like a 3 inch, 4 inch deep river. And then the next thing we knew the Animal Control Officer was evacuating us because all the police were up at the landslide.

Starbuck: The whole time we were waiting to find out what was happening. When can we go back? Can we buy this house? Will the bank allow it now? And in the end we went to the fire station and Al Stevens [Sitka’s former Assistant Fire Chief] took us back into Command Central, which was really impressive and he went over everything he knew with us. Showed us all the maps. We talked to a geologist that was there. We talked to someone from the Coast Guard who had flown over. We spent the weekend thinking about it.

KCAW: So that was the weekend after the landslide?

Starbuck: Mhmm. And we closed on Monday (08-24-15).

KCAW: What made you ultimately come down on the side of, ‘Yes, we’re going to buy?’

Starbuck: Ultimately, we decided that the land had already slid in that spot and that it wasn’t likely to slide again. And that we felt safe. Which is strange because we didn’t feel safe at the same time. But we felt like it was going to be safe.

In addition to demolishing the house under construction at 410 Kramer Avenue, the landslide destroyed the garage of 420 Kramer Avenue. (Emily Kwong/KCAW photo)

Starbuck: We walk up there and look at it and the kids have a lot of questions because they’re young. They’re 4 and 5, so they were 3 and 4 when the landslide happened. We try not to freak them out about it, but it was all the talk in town and they heard it everywhere they went.

KCAW: What kinds of things were they asking about?

Starbuck: They wanted to know, ‘Can we sleep here at night? Is our house going to move?’ I wanted to feel like I was telling them the truth. That we were totally safe. Like, ‘Yes, we’re going to sleep here. We’re totally safe.’ And I think I didn’t really feel like that. All of my neighbors have said this too. When the rains start coming really heavy and any sound that you hear, you’re just a little more jumpy. Because I was always feeling like, ‘If we see that same flow of water, then we’re going to go.’ That was just for the first month, because it did rain pretty hard after that. That first month. And then I felt a little more relaxed about that.

Starbuck:  Our specific piece of property has three different levels. Three different colors. Like Neopolitan. It’s high risk, medium risk, low risk. We’re all kind of wondering what that’s going to mean for resale. We’re not planning on going anywhere for the next 10-15 years. We’ll be here.

KCAW: What do you hope for the area in the future?

Starbuck: My big hope would be that the city would take the extra rock from the dam and they would build a berm. I don’t know legal-wise if that’s even possible, but that would be my hope. Just to protect that land.

Click here to view a report on South Kramer Avenue from Shannon & Wilson.

Shannon & Wilson conducted a geotechnical survey, to map future risk for properties below Gavan Hill. Red represents high risk, yellow medium risk, and green low risk.

KCAW: One last thing. How has it changed you personally? The landslide?

Starbuck: I think something positive, if you can even look at it like that, was the generosity of Sitka and the way that people come together for things. I think it’s unusual. When my family comes up here, they comment on it all the time — how we have this sense of community that’s just amazing. And, really when you look at that…all those people who were up there looking for William [Stortz] and the Diaz brothers [Elmer and Ulises], volunteering their time. All the police and the fire department. We had so many people say, ‘Come and stay with us.’ We had people give us money. We had people walk into a restaurant and pay for our dinner like (snaps). It’s just…it was really overwhelming how kind people are and how this community pulls together. So while the landslide itself was a huge negative, terrible thing, you always look for the helpers to look for the positive light.

“While the landslide itself was a huge negative, terrible thing, you always look for the helpers to look for the positive light,” said property owner Ariel Starbuck. (Emily Kwong/KCAW photo)

In the wake of the August 18th landslide, local leadership found itself in an unprecedented situation, offering words of comfort to the community while processing the catastrophe themselves. (Mike Hicks/KCAW photo)

For much of Sitka, the August 18, 2015 landslide was a wake-up call that even the most settled parts of Alaska remain dynamic — and sometimes dangerous — places. Local leadership found itself in an unprecedented situation, offering comfort to the community while processing the catastrophe themselves.

In part 2 of our 5-part series looking back at the Sitka Landslide, KCAW’s Robert Woolsey  spoke with Mayor Mim McConnell about how the community has tried to regain its emotional footing.

Downloadable audio.

McConnell: Thinking back to that time, I had been going through a phase where I was questioning my abilities as Mayor and how much I could really bring to the community. When that happened, [I saw] that need in the community for a figurehead to be that stability and a calming voice, saying, ‘We can get through this. We can do this.’

Woolsey: Where do you think Sitka is in terms of its emotional well-being? There’s one thing about readiness and physical preparedness, but…the other day you were in Maine, but it started to rain here. Kind of heavily. In August. And people aren’t quite back where they were.

Gov. Bill Walker (right) and Sitka Mayor Mim McConnell visited the site of the Kramer Avenue landslide on Wednesday, August 19. (Rachel Waldholz, KCAW)

McConnell: Well, it’s a loss of innocence. That landslide destroyed any innocence or naïveté about what our land is like here. It was a reality check. ‘Oh, we can have landslides here. They can kill people. We better pay attention. We better learn about this.’ And so I feel like we’ve been on this road of discovery, of ‘Okay, what do we know? What do we need to know? What do we need to know to make decisions about where we want to live?’ And of course that lead into some political decisions and economic decisions. And I think we’re still kind of working our way through that. I don’t think we’re done yet.

Woolsey: Has it affected you personally and the way you look back on the time you served in Sitka?

McConnell: I would say that…it definitely had an impact on me. I have not gone back to that site since all that. I keep thinking, ‘I need to drive up there and go look.’ But I haven’t. I’ve seen it from the air, but I haven’t’ driven up there yet. I think there’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like going and dealing with all that right now. I will at some point. It also had a maturing effect on me as Mayor. I grew up and had to do some hard things and speak to the world about what’s going on here. I had to reach beyond myself to do that.

Municipal administrator Mark Gorman visited the landslide site for the first time three weeks ago. He went to choose the location of a yellow cedar bench, carved in honor of the lives that were lost. Gorman spoke with KCAW’s Emily Kwong about visiting the area on year later.

Downloadable audio.

Gorman: It was very powerful for me because, as anybody who was up there at the time or goes up there now knows, it looks very peaceful and recovered. There’s green grass growing. You cannot imagine the disharmony of the moment of a year ago, yet the ghost of it was very, very present for me, as I was up there feeling…haunted by it. I’ve heard that expression used by others. It’s a very profound feeling of loss up there. And that with time may dissipate, but it’s an emotion felt by many. The first responders, the family members, the community who’d been up there. And maybe with time people will become more comfortable with that.

Kwong: Where do conversations about landslide mitigation stand now?

Gorman: [There’s] a whole discussion about risk mapping Sitka. For example, we know in Kramer where we have mapped that there are high risk zones, but we haven’t defined high risk. Does that mean there’s a high risk a landslide will occur in 50 years? 100 years? Or 1000 years? And what is our risk tolerance and I think that’s something we’re looking at.

Gorman: This community came together in a very profound and potent way. And that still resonates with me. The strength of this community to come together during times of need and tragedy is really quite phenomenal and very empowering. I think collectively it embraced those in most need. And it certainly has instilled in me a sense of immense gratitude to my fellow residents and neighbors in Sitka.

This Thursday (08-16-16) at 12 p.m., the city will commemorate the park bench at the Cross Trail off Kramer avenue. This will be followed by an unveiling of a portrait of William Stortz at 1 p.m. at City Hall.

Click here to see more stories from “Sitka Landslide: A Look Back”