Sole and Buttercup, two of the victims of a snowmachine collision on the Denali Highway/Mike Parker via Facebook
Charges brought in dog deaths
A professional snowmachine rider from Minnesota has been charged with reckless driving in connection with the death of three sled dogs and injuries to more in a collision along Alaska’s Denali Highway in December.
Alaska State Troopers have been investigating the crash for months and late last week filed a single misdemeanor charge against 48-year-old Erik Johnson, a resident of Roseau, Minn., the home of Polaris Industries.
A LinkedIn page for Johnson describes him as a professional test driver at Polaris Industries. One of the nation’s largest snowmobile manufacturers, Polaris had a team of riders testing machines on the Denali when one driven by Johnson is alleged to have slammed into a dog team driven by Mike Parker.
Johnson could not be immediately reached for comment.
The statement went on to say that “safe riding is central to how we operate. Our employees who are responsible for testing our snowmobiles are expert riders that (sic) have significant riding experience.
“In addition to their long-time riding experience, our test riders must meet our detailed training requirements, which includes industry training, as well as internal trainings (sic) and meeting our internal requirements. They are required to follow our riding safety protocols, such as staying within posted speed limits, wearing proper riding gear, and abiding by regulations of the local area.”
The legal speed limit on the Denali is unclear. There is a 40 mph sign along the road near Cantwell, but most of the highway has no signs and appears to fall under a general Alaska Department of Transportation regulations that stipulate speeds of 20 mph in business districts, 25 mph in residential districts, and “55 miles per hour on any other roadway.”
But even if there were a posted speed, it wouldn’t matter because Troopers have declared speed limits don’t apply to the road in winter because it isn’t plowed.
No accident
Parker was training a team of Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race veteran Jim Lanier’s well-known “Northern White” huskies when the dogs were hit head-on by a snowmachine in a group of snowmachines he said were “hauling ass” toward Cantwell on the summer-only Denali.
He said he saw their headlights coming in the dark and that they made no obvious attempt to slow down. He believes it is impossible they could have failed to notice him with his headlamp lighting up his dog team.
How fast they were going, he doesn’t know, but he estimated their speed at well in excess of 50 mph. The first two machines went safely by the team, but the third hit it.
How Troopers decided that the speed limit on the road in winter doesn’t apply is unclear. A trooper spokesman emailed that troopers “view public roadways that are in a non-maintained state as public land or public trails. We do not enforce speed limits, stop sign violations, etc when a road is not being maintained.”
There appears to be nothing in state law to stipulate that unplowed roads divert to status as public land or public trails, and the Alaska Department of Law, asked about all this weeks ago, has yet to explain who decided that traffic laws don’t apply on roads that are non-maintained.
Many of the roads in the city of Anchorage were non-maintained for days, in some cases for more than a week, after unusually heavy snows earlier this winter, and traffic laws appeared to remain in force. But this was an unusual situation for the state’s largest city.
The same is not unusual for the Denali, Alaska Highway 8, which closes to traffic in the fall.
Left unplowed in the winter months, the largely unpaved and desolate roadway that runs along the south side of the Alaska Range for 135 miles from the ghost-town of Paxson in the east to the not much bigger community of Cantwell, population of about 200, in the west has long been in use as a testing ground for Lower 48 snowmobile manufacturers.
Increasingly since the start of the new millennium, too, it has become a training track for Iditarod teams as the Last Great Race has morphed from a challenge of men and dogs against the wilderness to an extended, doggie version of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Ironically, the volume of snowmachine traffic along the road helps to pack in a trail well-suited to conditioning dog teams to motor along at a fast trot for hours on end rather than gearing down to struggle through soft snow. This is important in an event that has over the years become more and more about team speed than about team power and durability.
The convergence of more dog teams and more snowmachines on the Denali led to what might be considered an inevitable conflict.
Ticket and fined
One of three Seavey teams training on the highway at the time, this one was under the control of a young handler from Montana who was deeply traumatized by a collision that left two dogs dead and several others injured.
Gibbs was cited for “negligent driving” in the wake of the accident. State court records reflect that he offered a plea of “no contest” the citation and has since paid a fine of $320. Some have criticized that as a mere slap on the wrist.
But for killing two dogs, Gibbs was fined $220 more than newly identified driver Russell E. Webb who this summer ran over and killed retired dentist Carlton Higgins while he was legally using a city crosswalk intended to protect pedestrians.
The Anchorage Police Department (APD) for months shielded Webb as its normal practice for drivers involved in collisions involving vulnerable road users. A police spokeswoman has previously explained that this is because collisions that kill pedestrians and cyclists are only “ticketable offenses,” not real crimes.
APD apparently bowed to public pressure after The Alaska Landmine did a story revealing the penalty imposed on the driver who killed Higgins and noted that “drivers who break traffic laws and kill pedestrians face significantly lower penalties than those levied for littering, chasing moose, or using studded tires out of season.”
Killing dogs by running into them with a snowmachine can now be added to that list. The Russell E. Webb in question appears to be Russell Eugene Webb, a former deputy commissioner of the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services now retired and the husband of retired Anchorage District Court Judge Stephanie Rhoades.
No matter how this might look, there are no indications – let alone any evidence – to indicate his connections had anything to do with the way APD handled the case.
In Anchorage – as in South Dakota where the state attorney general drove off the roadway surface to run down and kill a vulnerable road user only to suffer a slap on the wrist for bad driving – the penalties for killing pedestrians or cyclists appear to be normally minor if there are any penalties at all.
The same would be likely to prove the case in Alaska, but a deep dive into the data here is difficult because both APD and troopers shield the names of drivers who kill vulnerable road users. And looking up court cases to find out what, if anything, happened with cases involving nameless individuals, is just about impossible.
“……… The Russell E. Webb in question appears to be Russell Eugene Webb, a former deputy commissioner of the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services now retired and the husband of retired Anchorage District Court Judge Stephanie Rhoades.……”
Huh. Imagine that. Well, it looks like it’s time for us car and snowmobile fodder to eat cake, Craig.
Great story Craig!
Great story Craig, snowmachine groups are particularly dangerous because anyone behind the leader can be suddenly be blinded. Speed limits are a joke.
What a travesty.
That irresponsible snowmobile driver took the lives of galant animals. Never to be replaced.
He scarred the musher for life.
He damaged his own life.
Now he’s wasting the time of law enforcement ,courts , the team owners and family, even the public who are paying for law enforcement and the courts:
All because he was careless and drove dangerously.
All i can say is thank god it wasn’t a human that was killed.
The beginning of the highway is used daily by skiers, walkers and fat tire cyclists.
It was completely irresponsible for polaris to use this as a speed training ground.
Regarding private lawsuits/ civil suits
Craig is right. Just compensation is
Unlikely and a hard hill to climb.
The troopers and judicial system are not doing their jobs.
The law requires responsible motor vehicle operation throughout the state. Even off the highway.
In reality law enforcement and the judicial is the root of these deaths because their silk glove treatment sends the message that personal irresponsibility while driving is acceptable. Law enforcement does not have the right to distort public law where the public has mandated certain public safety laws and policies regarding motor vehicle operating. Especially on trails and roads used by pedestrians and animals since time immemorial.
The toughest hill ? Class action?
The Denali highway trail system has been used by sled dogs and pedestrians possibly for thousands of years. It’s littered with historical native sites.
It was a main trail system for miners , hunters, travelers and freighters before many of our other high ways since early modern history . It was a primary cut through.
Pedestrians, dogs and horses far predate this route and should be respected.
Why is this even a discussion? Where did common decency go ?
The difference between Anchorage’s “unplowed” roads and highways and the Denali Highways is. The Denali highway is posted not maintained after a certain date, or is posted not maintained after this point. Anchorage roads were not plowed because the have idiots in charge of maintenance, but they are still maintaining them, just not as fast as other cities do in Alaska.
Frank: That’s what the story said, so I think we all undertand that. What’s your point? Those things don’t change the law, and this is supposed to be nation of laws. If rules aren’t going to apply to certain roads because they are non-maintained, shouldn’t there be a law saying so? Or do you think we should allow troopers to make up their own laws?
In those low snow years when the Denali remains open after it is officially closed, should someone be able to stage a road race there becuase speed limits are now gone?
P.S. Anchorage’s problems don’t appear to have been due to “idiots in charge,” but instead due to the volume of snow overwhelming the equipment and manpower. It was, in military terms, a simple old “force ratio” issue. The weather arrived with an overwhelming force that buried Anchorage maintence crews. I’d expect the outcome would even worse in your neighborhood up north if Fairbanks ever got the same volume of relatively heavy snow in the same period of time.
An interesting fact is the Denali highway is maintained effectively as a snow highway for much of the winter with public grant funds and a large snowcat . ( or used to be ) is its still?
Does this negate the status of un maintained??
Several racing kennels now live full time on the highway.
Jeff king and others have maintained the highway for sled dogs up around 40 plus years with occasional groomers . So im told .
Dogs used to punch a trail in every winter.
Before snowmobiles were reliable enough to do do so.
Swenson often used it as a testing ground for Eukanuba / Iams products with full veterinary documentation and support the locals tell me .
People camp out there for months at a time and all kinds of mushing tours and races have run there . George Attla used to be a local hero there with his picture plastered on the boards in gas stations in cantwell .
Three full or part time kennels are established on the Denali highway currently.
Its definitely a historical sled dog route.
If we are a nation of laws? I was told, when you read a law/regulation. There are three ways of reading it. 1. The plain black and white. 2. Then intent of what the law/regulation was made. 3. the spirit of the law/regulation. Another observation i see, is when there is a court proceeding. At a minimum there are three lawyers involved and at the end of the court proceeding, at i minimum two lawyers go home seemingly satisfied. So what is the law on even having snowmachines on the highway and the same for dog mushers? I am most certain the regulation does not allow for snowmachines on the drivable surface of the road. I cannot state as fact, that dog mushing is allowed on the drivable surface of the road. These two events are tragic. Alaska is getting smaller every year and people as u continually point out are less attentive to think of other users (its all about self today) via a road or trail.
No the same problem dose not exist for the entire winter in Fairbanks, when there a high snow fall year. a quick search reveals Fairbanks has exceeded 100″ of snow in a year and Anchorage has only done that 5 times. Anchorage learned nothing from last year when it happen also.
First off, it’s not about record snow falls; it’s about daily/weekly snowfalls and the nature of the snow, wihch is a lot easier to deal with if it is cold, light snow than if it is heavy wet snow. Anchorage in a marine coastal environment is prone to heavier, wetter snow than Fairbanks in cold, continental environment.
But the simple reality here is we don’t know what a mess Fairbanks might have if it had a winter with more than 100 inches of snow or several days with feet of snow because Fairbanks has 100 inches of snow or more for 32 years, and a lot has changed in those 32 years, starting with greater expectations on how fast the streets should be cleared.
The climate records would indicate that since the new milleniusm, Faribanks has only gone over the “normal” winter snow of 65 inches only 10 times, and in most of those years it only went 10 percent over. The only time it came close to 100 was the winter of 2021-2022 https://www.weather.gov/media/afg/climate/Fairbanks_Rankings_Snow_Yearly.pdf
And in seems that in that winte rof 2021-2222, with less than 100 inches, Fairbnaks was having more a few problems digging out: https://alaskapublic.org/2021/12/30/alaskans-in-the-interior-digging-out-after-a-wintry-weekend-wallop-of-snow-ice-wind/
Record snowfall in the beginning of the winter the last 2 years. Last year it came in Dec, with 3 12″ class dumps over 10 days or so. Took street mx a few weeks to catch up. Snow was being removed in mid-Jan. This year, the dumps happened in Nov. Same drill. Record snow and it took a while to catch up.
Did see something new with sno removal this year. Previous years used graders to build a burm in the middle of the street. A industrial snow blower put that volume into a chain of dumptrucks. This time around, they make the original pass with the snow blower cutting burms on the sides of the road directly into dumptrucks. They clean up with a quick pass by graders. Goes a lot faster. Innovation. What a concept. Cheers –
Regardless of criminal justice meted out, the civil lawsuit is a common method to seek accountability and restitution – right?
Yes and no. That works great if you’ve got the money to pay a lawyer or can get one to take it one contingency, in which case you might not get a lot out of it after the attorney fees are paid but at least you get the satisfaction of imposing some sort of punishment. Think the family of Ron Goldman versus O.J. Simpson who escaped criminal prosecution but was sued in a civil court, judged responsible for the death of Goldman and his ex-wife, and ordered to pay the Goldman estate $33.5 million.
The last report I saw said he has to date paid $123,000 and owes $96 million due to the accumulate interest on the original award: https://www.nbcsports.com/nfl/profootballtalk/rumor-mill/news/o-j-simpson-currently-owes-ron-goldmans-estate-96-million
And if you sue someone with little money, it’s probably going to cost you more than you can ever hope to collect because you probably won’t find an attorney will to take the case on contingency or pro bono. The interesting twist in this case is that Lanier might be able to go after Polaris because the individual who killed his dogs was at the time working for Polaris, and those dogs are valuable and there is the pain and suffering both he and Parker went through, which is significant when you dogs get killed before your eyes.
No telling how an Alaska jury might handle that, but I’d expect Polaris would want to settle and be done with it if any such case were filed.
Get the offer from Schlehofer….