Tragedy in Eagle

After the 4th of July things went downhill in Eagle. I headed down the Yukon River, stationed at a back country cabin in the preserve, and 10 days later when I returned, there had been a suicide, our custom’s agent, Chuck, was missing, and the Taylor highway was closed.

The suicide was a domestic dispute - a couple arguing over weather or not to pull out of Eagle and return to Germany. The boyfriend walked out the door, and the next thing he heard was a gun shot. Chuck, the custom’s agent that checks the passports of the few folks that cross into the US from Canada via the Yukon River was called to secure the area, and file the report. He spent the rest of the afternoon consoling the boyfriend.

Because Eagle has no police, things such as filing a suicide report fall into Chuck’s bailiwick, which was extensive to say the least. At 7pm the following day, Chuck headed out on the Taylor Highway to Beaver Creek, the border crossing on the Alaskan Highway, to deliver the suicide report to the authorities. The problem was that Chuck never showed up at Beaver Creek.

It took a day, maybe two, for people to start wondering what happened to Chuck. News travels quicker than you’d think in Eagle, but action is generally slow and premeditated. Was a search underway? Was he crushed by a rock slide? Did he drive off the road? Has anyone even driven the road to look for him? The answer to the last question was no. Just as Chuck was headed out on the evening of July 6th it started raining, and it’s been raining ever since.

Eagle received almost 6 inches of rain in the month of July, the average annual rainfall is 12 inches. The resulting effect was mudslides, blown out culverts, and extensive subsidence of the Taylor Highway. Things didn’t look good for Chuck. Finally, a week later the crash site was located. A state trooper in a helicopter patrolling spotted Chuck’s vehicle 300 feet down a cliff in a torrent of raging water known as O’brien Creek.

On July 15th I headed out on my bike for Dawson City in the Yukon Territory of Canada; home of the Klondike Gold Rush in 1898, and currently home of the Dawson City Music Festival. The road was closed, but I was determined to make the 140 miles on my bike. Music, beer, and women awaited me in Dawson City and I was going to be at that festival come Hell or high water…little did I know I’d have to ride through both to get there.

As I approached the area where Chuck drove off the road, I did my best to intently study the crash site. A set of tire tracks, too low on an inside corner dropped onto the soft shoulder and abruptly headed down the steep boulder face into the flooded O’brien Creek. I hollered out a few times just to make myself feel better, but looking at the path of destruction and debris leading down to the water I already knew.

A lot of time passed. Search teams eventually worked the area. Scent dogs and swiftwater rescue teams tried their best. A buddy, frustrated by overdue search efforts and stranded in Eagle himself, started crooning “where the fuck is Chuck?” while playing his guitar after one to many glasses of whiskey.

The town was struggling with the loss and Chuck’s family needed closure. Chuck was a huge part of Eagle; way more than just a custom’s agent. He was always there for the residents, whether that meant helping locals with their fish nets or cooking up huge meals for the residents last year, who were overwhelmed by a devastating flood that wiped out many of the homes along the Yukon.

Unfortunately, the Yukon River doesn’t often give up its dead, and the chances of finding Chuck's body were slim to none. At Eagle, the river is flowing at 227,000 cubic feet per second and during that 1 second 2 tons of sediment pass by. This all means that it’s hard to find a body in a river like the Yukon, but on August 19th Chuck was found. His body had been carried 5 miles down O’brien Creek to the 40 Mile River which had just crested at its highest flood stage. From there, Chuck’s body moved 35 miles down the 40 Mile River and out into the Yukon. He was then carried 50 miles down stream to the confluence of Mission Creek and the Yukon. After traveling through 90 miles of flood waters, Chuck had returned home to Eagle.