inside today a4 good boy, 16, charged as adult in shooting...
TRANSCRIPT
Emily Schwing Emily Schwing Emily Schwing
coverage of the 2 0 14 Iditarod
12503080-3-11-14
Matthew Schroder Matthew Schroder Matthew Schroder
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T H E V O I C E O F I N T E R I O R A L A S K A S I N C E 1 9 0 3
SOURDOUGH JACK:
“I don’t care much for that sci-fi stuff. Those aliens give me the shivers.”
The weather.Today will be sunny.
High today .............. 13Low tonight ........... -17
WEATHER » A7
GOODMORNING
Classified » C1 | Comics » C6 | Dear Abby » Latitude 65 | Markets » C7 | Obituaries » A5 | Opinion » A6 | Outdoors » B1 | Weather » A7INSIDE
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Fort Knox owners propose re-routing part of Cleary Summit to Gilmore Dome Trail. » A4Inside Today
GUIDE TO THE GALAXYThe Marlin to host sci-fi costume party.
LATITUDE 65
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Aurora forecast.Auroral activity will be low. Weather permit-ting, low displays will be visible overhead from Barrow to Fairbanks.
This information is provid-ed by aurora forecasters at the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. For more infor-mation about the aurora, visit http://www.gi.alaska.edu/AuroraForecast
ON THE WILD SIDEArctic Audubon Society presentation looks back at the establishment of ANWR.
OUTDOORSPage B1
Fairbanks Community Museum president Bob Eley, top, and vice president Diane Fleeks hang a map of the Arctic Winter Games venues Thursday at the museum. The two were preparing their First Friday display “Arctic Winter Games Then and Now.”
SAM HARREL/NEWS-MINER
THEN AND NOW
Boy, 16, charged as adult in shooting By Sam [email protected]
A 16-year-old boy has been charged as an adult for his alleged role in a robbery and shootout last week at a Fairbanks
apartment. Chester Clifton Fields Jr., of Fair-
banks, is accused of robbing a Wedge-wood Resort apartment at gunpoint Feb. 25 and shooting one of the occu-pants with a 9mm pistol. Fields’ alleged
accomplice, 21-year-old Isaiah Cross, was injured in the ensuing gunfight with one of the occupants of the apartment.
Fields has been charged with first-degree felony assault, first-degree robbery and felony burglary, according to an entry posted Thursday on online court records website Courtview.
Fairbanks police said Fields con-
fessed to his role in the shooting, according to the criminal com-plaint filed earlier this week against Cross. Alaska State Troopers stopped Fields as he walked across College Road near Antoinette Street short-ly after the early morning shooting.
Teen accused of injuring man during robbery
SHOOTING » A9
Tesoro pulls the plug on Arctic Man sponsorshipBy Tim [email protected]
The Arctic Man Ski and Sno-Go Classic is looking for a new name sponsor after oil com-pany Tesoro Corp. dropped its sponsorship of the race more than two months ago.
Race director Howie Thies confirmed the split to the News-Miner on Thursday and said he’s working to find a new sponsor to fill the $25,000 void left by Tesoro’s exit. The race, scheduled for April 11, will go on, Thies said.
“You know me, I ain’t going to give up,” a determined Thies said. “We’re not going to back out.”
Tesoro informed Thies on Jan. 3 that it would not be sponsoring this year’s race, ending a 20-year relationship with the event in which it served as the major sponsor.
“It was kind of a shocker,” Thies said.
TESORO » A9
Mayors voice concerns over gas line projectBy Matt [email protected]
JUNEAU — New roads, new schools, new fire stations and even new pools are just some of the things communities could need to cope with construction and population booms if the large diameter natural gas pipeline the Legislature is discussing is built.
Exactly how local communities will pay for those expanded public services when the cur-rent proposal could do away with traditional property taxes on the pipeline system brought concerned borough mayors to the Senate Finance Committee table Thursday.
MAYORS » A9
Oatley shatters course record to win Iditarod Trail InvitationalBy Tim [email protected]
When he decided to ride his bike 1,000 miles to Nome in this year’s Idi-tarod Trail Invitational human-pow-ered race, Jeff Oatley took three weeks
off from his job as an engineer at the Natural Resource Conservation Service in Fairbanks. Oatley figured it might take him that long, or even lon-ger, to make it to Nome.
“That was my plan, to take up to three weeks, and if I needed more
time, I would have called (work) and gotten more time off and kept going,” Oatley said on Thursday, a day after he pedaled his fat-tired bike into Nome in the record time of 10 days, 2 hours, 53 minutes.
Needless to say, Oatley never had to
call work, and he’ll be banking a week of unused vacation time.
Taking advantage of the best trail conditions in the 14-year histo-ry of the race, Oatley, 44, shattered
INVITATIONAL » A10