Daily Sitka Sentinel

Final Victim Recovered at Site of Landslide

By TOM HESSE and

SHANNON HAUGLAND

Sentinel Staff Writers

Searchers recovered the body of William Stortz Tuesday afternoon, one week after he was last seen in the path of a massive landslide.

The remains of the other two men killed in the Kramer Avenue landslide were recovered in the days immediately after the Aug. 18 disaster.

Mayor Mim McConnell issued a statement Tuesday saying recovery of the final victim will allow the families to move forward. 

“I am very proud of the job the responders did, and the way the entire community pulled together during this very sad time,” McConnell said. “We have found these men who were much loved and brought some closure for their families.”

Stortz, 62, was the city building official, and was on Kramer Avenue the morning of Aug. 18 to inspect the city drainage systems in the wake of a torrential downpour earlier in the day.

Brothers Elmer Diaz, 26, and Ulises Diaz, 25, were working inside a house under construction at 410 Kramer Ave. when the landslide struck. The body of Elmer Diaz was recovered the day after the slide, and Ulises’ on the next day.

City officials said Stortz was found on the southern end of the landslide area, opposite the location of the Diaz brothers. Excavators, multiple dog teams and dozens of searchers were employed in looking for the missing men. The ongoing search for Stortz was delayed at times because of concerns about the dangerous shifting of the massive debris field. 

“William was hard-working, intelligent, and a very kind man,” McConnell said in her statement. “Our family knew him and he was well-respected throughout Sitka. William and the Diaz brothers will be missed. One day the landslides will be cleaned up, but Sitka will never be the same.”

The slides left a debris field that engineers estimated at 45,000 cubic yards. Even as the body recovery was under way, engineers were directing work to relieve the pressure of the water and mud slurry at the toe of the slide to prevent damage to the other residential areas just below the slide area.

With the last of the victims recovered, the emergency effort became entirely focused on clearing the area and preventing further damage. A large pump was flown in Tuesday to help drain the area, and a battalion chief of the Seattle Fire Department, Thomas Richardson, flew in to give guidance. Richardson worked on last year’s slides at the town of Oso, Wash., which killed more than 40 people. Richardson said that tragedy has a lot in common with what happened in Sitka last week. 

“It’s very similar. It’s déjà vu. Both the techniques that they’re using and the conditions they’re encountering are almost identical to what we had,” Richardson said.

He added that he doesn’t consider himself an expert, just someone with experience that no one has until they’re forced into a situation. 

“Most people don’t have a lot of experience. We didn’t have any experience responding to landslides,” he said. “Oso was by far the biggest one that any of us had ever encountered. It was around a square mile.”

It took around four months for all of the bodies to be recovered from that slide, and Richardson said techniques used were similar to those being used in Sitka, and that the cleanup efforts on the Kramer Avenue slide are going well. 

“I think they’ve been efficient with their operation from the beginning,” he said. 

City Clerk Sara Peterson, the designated spokesperson for the city’s emergency effort, said operations now are focused entirely on cleanup and repairing the damaged city infrastructure.

“We’re still in emergency recovery mode until Jacobs Circle residents are able to get back into their houses,” Peterson said. “We’re assessing the water and power issues for Jacobs Circle, we’re trying to get those people back in their homes as soon as possible.” 

The slide cut off water and power to that neighborhood, which is just off Kramer Avenue closer to Halibut Point Road.

A fire hydrant was knocked 10 feet down Kramer Avenue in the slide, and the one-inch water line to the destroyed house at 410 Kramer Ave. was also broken, causing water to drain into the debris field. Buggins said they are troubleshooting to discover leaks, and making repairs.

“At 5:30 a.m. my guys came up and pressured-up the 16-inch pipe past Jacobs Circle, and the hydrant is leaking,” Environmental Superintendent Mark Buggins said today. “We have to dig back, and find the valve to isolate the hydrant.”

It will take a couple of days just to reach the hydrant to make repairs and restore water service to Jacobs Circle, Buggins said.

“We’re working on doing what we need to do to restore water and power, and making sure the sanitary sewer will work,” he said. 

Buggins said tests run this afternoon confirmed that the sanitary sewer is working as it should for the three homes on Jacobs Circle.

“We don’t want to tell people they can go back, and five days later they find out they have no sewer,” Buggins said.

The houses on Kramer Avenue and Jacobs Circle are still without electrical power.

“We have to figure out how to restore power to what and when,” said Utility Director Bryan Bertacchi. He said one of the city’s power boxes is buried in the slide debris.