Nome Kennel Club re-establishes trail tripods on Iditarod Trail
Last fall, debating how to best celebrate the 50th running of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog race and contributing to safe travels on the Iditarod trail, the Nome Kennel Club board decided on a project to reestablish trail markings between Nome and Topkok. Tripod replacements were long overdue. “We had noticed a lot of missing tripods or knocked down tripods over the years,” said Stephanie Johnson, president of the Nome Kennel Club. She said it was especially sparse between Nome and Hastings, and between Solomon and Topkok. “That’s the blowhole,” she said. “It can get very treacherous through that area.”
The Nome Kennel Club received a grant from the Iditarod Historic Trail Alliance (IHTA) to build 200 tripods along the winter trail between Nome and Topkok. The Nome Kennel Club used the grant to purchase 600 timbers for the 200 new tripods, along with reflectors and some tools. The Iditarod Trail Committee helped pay for the freight to get everything flown up to Nome. Once the materials arrived in Nome, NKC volunteers set out to prepare the timbers by cutting and reflectorizing. Bering Straits Native Corporation’s Stampede shop supported the project by storing the materials and allowing the use of the heated shop for preparatory work. In December and January, NKC volunteers held work sessions to cut and reflectorize the timbers and soon after the volunteers set out to begin installing the tripods on the trail. About 54 have been installed, with more on the way.
The tripods will help better mark the trail through a region with notoriously bad weather and poor visibility, to prevent mushers and snowmachiners alike from getting lost.
The timbers are each about eight feet long and attached at the top with a single bolt and a square reflector plate. The completed tripods stand about six feet high.
Johnson said NKC members Frank Carruthers and Kirsten Bey took lead on moving and processing the timbers. She also added that the project would not have been possible without BSNC’s donation of storage and workshop space.
Over the course of the winter, the tripods were driven onto the trail with snowmachines and installed one by one.
“We were hoping to get a lot more up before Iditarod, but it just hasn’t happened because of the weather,”
Johnson said. The grant period is two years, so they have all of next winter to get everything done.
This summer, Johnson said they would focus on tripoding the stretch of road from Cape Nome to Solomon.
On an annual basis, NKC stakes trails around Nome to mark heavily traveled trails in the immediate Nome area for mushers, skiers, snow-bikers and snowmachiners. NSEDC has in the past provided grants for the purchase of the trail stakes and reflective tape, with NKC volunteers reflectorizing, staking and maintaining the trails.