Donnelly Training Area

Army officials are investigating the death of a soldier over the weekend during a field training exercise near Fort Wainwright.

Army investigators have begun looking into the circumstances surrounding last weekend’s death of a soldier from Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson during a field-training exercise on a range near Fort Greely. But, investigators aren’t saying much about the case.

A state lawmaker from Healy is trying a new pitch for an old idea to build power lines from the Mat-Su to Glennallen and on around the eastern Interior road system. Rep. Dave Talerico says the Road Belt Electrical Transmission Line is needed to provide a more secure supply of electricity for the region’s growing military installations.

Some 6,000 military personnel from Fort Wainwright and Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson will deploy next week to the Fort Greely area for a big, two-week field training exercise to test the Stryker Brigade’s combat readiness. And while they’re training on the ground, the Air Force will launch its latest round of Red Flag aerial combat training out of Eielson Air Force Base and Joint Base Richardson Elmendorf.

Anthropologists with the University of Alaska Fairbanks say a site they’re excavating near the Delta River west of Fort Greely was first inhabited by people some 13,000 years ago – not long after humanity crossed over a now-submerged land bridge that connected Asia and North America. The anthropologists say that’s just one of the many discoveries they’ve made at the Delta River Overlook. And they say they’re just beginning to uncover its secrets.

Eielson Air Force Base officials say they reminded pilots and their commanders participating in a training exercise last month that they cannot harass wildlife that wanders onto military training ranges during a recent exercise. The issue came up after a pilot asked for permission to flow low over several bison to scare them away from the Donnelly Training Area near Fort Greely, where the aircraft were preparing for a live-fire training exercise.

One of the best moose-hunting areas in the Interior can be found on a military training range near Fort Greely. But a busy Army and Air Force training schedule is limiting hunters’ ability to get back into the area.