An archaeological site near Quinhagak, previously preserved in permafrost, was heavily damaged by Typhoon Halong earlier this month. Rick Knecht, a lecturer at the University of Aberdeen who has long worked in the area, raised the alarm regarding the risks of climate change to the Associate Press. “A longstanding concern has been the threat that climate change — melting permafrost, coastal erosion, the potential for more frequent or stronger storms — has posed to the site,” Knecht said.
Many items—among them wooden masks and tools—were recovered after the storm struck Quinhagak, a small village of 800 residents on the southwestern coast of Alaska that is part of the indigenous Yup’ik community. But strong winds and surges from the tropical cyclone scattered many more artifacts, perhaps up to 10,000, according to the AP, along the shoreline. Archaeologists first started excavating Nunalleq, as the archaeological site is called, in 2007. It is home to a substantial collection of Yup’ik artifacts from the period before the community made contact with European outsiders in the 19th century.
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With the help of the the Nunalleq Museum, Knecht and others have already begun work to salvage the rescued artifacts, removing marine salts from wood objects and using chemicals to prevent pieces from cracking as they dry out. The two-room local museum houses the world’s largest collection of Yup’ik artifacts, including prehistoric masks, ivory carvings, and dolls. “I think that’s really the future of museum work, to kind of decolonize and decentralize it, and give people an opportunity to engage with their own culture on a daily basis,” Knecht told Alaska Public Media in 2023.
