12:17pm: Elder's meditation for the day
"The Natural Law is the final and absolute authority governing E Te No Ha, the earth we call our Mother."
--Traditional Circle of Elders
There is no power greater than the Natural Laws. These powers were set up by the Great Spirit in such a way that the human being has no access to it, except by obeying. If we choose not to follow the Natural Laws, our live will be filled with confusion, tension, anxiety and stress. If we poison the Earth, we poison ourselves. If we poison the Water of the Earth, we poison ourselves. As we do to the Earth, we do to ourselves and our children, even the children unborn. May we think about this today and ask ourselves, "Are we holding and acting toward the Mother Earth in a good way?"
Great Spirit, teach me the Natural Laws that govern the Earth.
12:36pm: Good news!! In the News
Snettisham line repaired, hydro power restored
Snettisham is back on line.
A release from Alaska Electric, Light and Power says repairs were completed and hydro power restored at 9:17 Sunday evening.
The utility's Scott Willis says diesel generators were shut down at that time.
He says shutting off the generators so much earlier than originally expected will result in much lower rates during the second month of the emergency cost of power adjustment.
Willis says the rate could be lower than the 18 cents per kilowatt hour estimated last week which was based on a June 8th target date for getting Snettisham back on line.
A-E-L and P will announce the new rate early this week.
Willis says customers will not see the reduced rate until their next billing period. Until that time, he says customers who continue to conserve will save money on their electric bills.
The contractor had a bonus incentive for completing the work early. Willis did not know the size of the bonus when asked, but said it was well worth it in terms of the diesel energy it saved the community.
Spring King Derby results are official, Zura is the winner
Norman Zura is the official winner of the Tlingit Haida Central Council's Spring King Derby.
Zura turned in his 32.90 pound King on May 5th and waited nearly the entire month to see if it would hold up.
A big fish came in Saturday morning nearly 11 hours before the 7 p.m. deadline. Sixteen year old Dylan Kubley turned in a 31.45 King good for second place.
Ending up in third is a 31.40 King turned in by Paul Hanus.
The cut off for prizes, 30th place, is claimed by Chris Baldwin who turned in a 24.05 pound fish.
Zura's first place winnings is worth $7,599.25 including $5,000 cash.
Derby officials will hand out awards this Wednesday beginning at 6 p.m. at the Vocational Training and Resource Center on Hospital Drive.
JDHS wins state soccer championship
Juneau Douglas High School is the home to the men's soccer champions in Alaska.
The Crimson Bears defeated South of Anchorage 2 to 0 to claim the crown Saturday at the state soccer tournament.
Colin Flynn, the player of the year in Alaska, and Aaron Badilla, scored goals for the Bears.
United Airlines cites high fuel prices, poor economy for dropping Alaska flights
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - United Airlines plans to discontinue all Alaska flights in September, a decision it says was spurred by record fuel prices and a sagging U.S. economy.
Jeff Kovick, a spokesman for the Chicago-based airline, says the elimination of its Alaska service is part of the company's plan announced in April to cut domestic flights by 9 percent and reduce its fleet by 30 aircraft.
United flies between Anchorage and Chicago, Denver and San Francisco.
Kovick says the airline cut certain routes in other U.S. cities, but Anchorage is the only hub that United plans to drop entirely.
Stryker vehicles begin long journey to Middle East
FAIRBANKS, Alaska (AP) - The Stryker Brigade is shipping its equipment from Fairbanks to the Mideast in preparation for its fall deployment to Iraq.
The 1,100 vehicles used by the 1st Brigade 25th Infantry Stryker Brigade Combat Team -- including the eight-wheeled armored Strykers from which the unit gets its name -- were put on trains last week for the first leg of the journey.
The trains set off for Anchorage, where the vehicles will be loaded onto a ship destined for the Mojave Desert in California.
For many soldiers, the deployment will be a return trip to Iraq. The 1-25th was sent to Iraq for 16 months in 2005 and 2006.
US helps Japanese government search for remains of World War II soldiers on Aleutian Island
ATTU, Alaska (AP) - Searchers digging for days have found the remains of two Japanese soldiers buried in mass graves on the Aleutian island of Attu following one of the bloodiest battles of World War II.
U.S. and Japanese representatives traveled on a two-week mission to the remote resting place of nearly 2,500 soldiers.
On May 23rd, searchers struck their shovels on decaying wood boxes and found the well-preserved bones of the two Japanese soldiers who were likely buried by their comrades during the 1943 Battle of Attu.
Hiroshi Sato -- with Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare -- says he is -- QUOTE -- "very happy and satisfied that everybody's effort finally resulted in something that we all appreciate."
Army places radar in Juneau to track missile
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) - The Army's Missile Defense Agency is establishing a presence in Juneau.
The agency on Saturday placed a powerful, mobile radar station in Alaska's capital.
The radar array will take part in testing how well warheads can be knocked from the sky.
Three tractor-trailer-size radar units and support equipment were unloaded and placed by construction workers at the Ted Stevens Marine Research Institute at Lena Point.
Sometime in mid-July, a missile is scheduled to launch from Kodiak.
An intercepting missile may be fired from California to try to destroy the Kodiak missile.
Radar in Juneau will track the first part of the Kodiak missile's flight.
12:45pm: Rare Tlingit warrior's helmet captures $2 million at auction
A Tlingit warrior's helmet previously unknown to exist was recently sold to a private collector for what is believed to be a record amount for a Native American artifact at an auction.
On May 18, Fairfield Auction of Newton, Conn., hosted an auction that fetched $2,185,000 for the helmet that experts believe originated in the late 18th or early 19th century. An anonymous woman brought the piece to the company during an appraisal clinic several months ago, not realizing the value of the artifact, auction house owner Jack DeStories said.
"She didn't even understand it to be Native American necessarily," he said. "She didn't know; she just thought it was an interesting curiosity."
Little is known of the helmet or how it found its way to the East Coast from the traditional homeland of the Tlingit on the Northwest coast. DeStories said the consigner of the helmet received it as a gift in 1984 from her significant other but is unsure where it had come from prior to that.
"So she had basically had it sitting on a shelf for the past 24 years," he said. "To have something come out of the clear blue sky of that magnitude was pretty much a shock for everyone in our business."
The existence of the helmet and its sale to a private collector also came as a shock to Tlingit people, said Sealaska Heritage Institute President Rosita Worl.
"I was very, very, very sad that something as important and as significant as a war helmet is going into a private collection," said Worl, an anthropologist and Tlingit of eagle moiety. "Who knows when we'll ever see it again."
Worl said the issue is particularly sensitive because of the way traditional Tlingit law defines ownership of at.óow, or cultural objects, including crests, songs, names, stories and spirits.
"The significance of the helmet to us is it's not just an art piece, but it represents a tie to our ancestors, a tie to the spirit of our ancestors. So it's really sad to think of the possibility that it will never come home - unless of course the collector has a soul and heart and knows that the spirit of that helmet wants to come home," she said.
DeStories would not disclose who purchased the helmet or where the object will end up.
"The most I can say is a private collector," he said. "Even for minor things we hold that information confidential unless the buyer or seller chooses to be known."
Steve Henrikson, a curator at the Alaska State Museum, said there are only about 90 to 95 Tlingit warrior helmets known to exist in the world, most of which are in museums or private collections. He said it is remarkable for such helmet to surface after so many years.
"For someone that does a lot of research on Tlingit armor, I can't help but feel a little bit of excitement that something like this has just suddenly shown up out of the blue. It's something that doesn't happen every day and it makes me feel good to know that it exists," he said. "On the other hand, I wish there was a better way to handle things like this when they are found and identified."
Items from private collections generally do not fall under the Native American Graves and Repatriation Act and returning such cultural treasures to clans or tribes can be very difficult, Henrikson said.
"There are a lot of mechanisms that were used to take this material from Alaska Native clans, so the reason for the repatriation law was the concern that many of the objects were taken wrongfully or at least taken in a way that wasn't in keeping with traditional Native law," he said.
DeStories said he is aware of such laws and said he contacted experts at museums in Canada prior to the auction.
"The laws that apply to such items clearly didn't apply to this," he said. "We were aware of that right away. Aside from that, our job is to expose this to the marketplace for the consigner."
Henrikson said it would be very difficult to decipher the precise geographic location of the helmet or to what specific clan it is from. Regardless, people unfamiliar with the Tlingit people often don't realize the importance of such cultural objects.
"It certainly was never intended to be considered just a work of art and put in a glass case in someone's living room or even a museum," he said. "It was considered something beyond value that symbolized the clan."
Worl said it is more important to have the item return to its homeland than to identify which specific clan the helmet originated from.
"It's not a loss just to that one clan, but to the Tlingit people as a whole," she said.
DeStories said the real lesson of the whole story is that there are still great objects out there yet to be discovered.
"In this business you can go for months or even years without finding a really exceptional object," he said. "For everyone who's in our business it gives them hope that there are still great things out there, phenomenal things to be found."
(Juneau Empire)