A tour through 2024 in ADN photos

Looking back on a year of change, tension, hope, triumph and everyday joys.

By Loren Holmes, Bill Roth, Marc Lester, Anne Raup
Updated: December 30, 2024 Published: December 30, 2024

January 13. Over 500 educators and public education supporters gather at Town Square Park to advocate for a permanent increase to the Base Student Allocation in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

January 15. A white raven picks through discarded items near a trash bin and draws a crowd of photographers on West 27th Avenue in Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

January 16. People ice skate on Cheney Lake in East Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

January 17. Vehicles cross the Glenn Highway bridge at the Knik River near Palmer. The bridges, one built in 1990 and the other in 1965, are slated for their first major overhaul starting in 2024, although the start date could be pushed into next year due to a number of factors. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

January 17. A white raven tosses up a snack while feeding in Spenard. The rare bird is likely leucistic, which means it has a lack of the pigment melanin. (Bill Roth / ADN)

January 21. UAA junior Hayley Perkins competes on bars during the Seawolves' loss to UC Davis at the Alaska Airlines Center. (Bill Roth / ADN)

January 23. A worker cleans an entryway floor at Sullivan Arena in Anchorage. The arena, used as a homeless shelter during the pandemic, will begin hosting events this week. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

January 23. Musher Dutch Johnson, a kennel manager at The August Foundation for Alaska Racing Dogs, runs a dog team on Dee Lake in Chugiak. The lead dogs are illuminated for safety. (Bill Roth / ADN)

January 25. Ice crystals form on a clerestory window during below-zero temperatures in Anchorage. (Bill Roth / ADN)

January 25. Sunlight reflects into the fog from the Robert B. Atwood Building in downtown Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

January 25. A lone hockey player shoots a puck at a net at Westchester Lagoon while a full moon, known as a Wolf Moon, rises over Anchorage. (Bill Roth / ADN)

January 25. The setting sun makes an appearance under a thick layer of clouds and over Cook Inlet. (Anne Raup / ADN)

January 29. A vole gets air as it runs along Point Woronzof Road at the Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport. Voles are small mammals near the bottom of the food chain, eaten by many other animals and birds including owls, hawks, foxes and coyotes. Voles are found across much of Alaska but are rarely seen in the winter, since they mostly live in tunnels built under the snow, where they stay warm and safe from predators. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

January 29. Russ DuBrock shovels his roof on Turnagain Parkway in Anchorage after a heavy snowfall. (Marc Lester / ADN)

January 31. A maintenance crew removes snow from an undamaged portion of a building that suffered a partial roof collapse earlier in the day in South Anchorage. The building was the second roof collapse this week, and the sixth this winter, according to municipal building safety officials. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

February 12. A moose feeds on plants exposed during a windstorm near the Glen Alps Trailhead of Chugach State Park. (Marc Lester / ADN)

February 13. Jane McClure and Nukka, an 8-year-old Morkie, a cross between a Maltese and a Yorkshire terrier, glide past the Delaney Park Strip as temperatures reached 40 degrees in Anchorage. "The snow is wet and sticky, making it hard to maneuver," said McClure. "It gets the heart rate up." (Bill Roth / ADN)

February 23. A spotlight of the Alaska Marine Highway System ferry Kennicott assists the crew as it approaches Wrangell late in the day. (Marc Lester / ADN)

February 25. Wearing a red fox hat, Ethan Snowbarger, 10, holds up two red fox pelts during the Southcentral Chapter of the Alaska Trappers Association Fur Rondy auction. (Bill Roth / ADN)

February 29. Ryan Redington, Knik, Alaska. Photographed at the Iditarod musher banquet in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

March 2. Sean Williams mushes alongside Tudor Road during the ceremonial start of the Iditarod in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

March 7. Parachutes deploy as paratroopers jump from an Air Force C-17 Globemaster. Seventy women from the Army’s 11th Airborne Division parachuted into Malemute Drop Zone on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson. The all-female exercise was held in honor of Women’s History Month. (Marc Lester / ADN)

March 9. Skiers make their way higher on the mountain at the Hatcher Pass / Independence Mine State Historical Park area. Hatcher Pass is in the Talkeetna Mountains, the Chugach Mountains are in the background. (Anne Raup / ADN)

March 11. Grace Allaway, a U16 racer from Team Yukon, launches from the start while competing in the giant slalom at Skeetawk in Hatcher Pass during the Mat-Su Arctic Winter Games. Pioneer Peak is visible, at left, across the Matanuska Valley. (Bill Roth / ADN)

March 12. Second place musher Matt Hall looks over his team after finishing the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Nome. (Anne Raup / ADN)

March 14. Alaska's Eva Driggs shoots during the Arctic Winter Games snowshoe biathlon competition at Kincaid Park in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

March 14. Sunset colors the clouds and makes alpenglow on the Kenai Mountains. (Anne Raup / ADN)

March 18. Senate President Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, greets supporters of a veto override vote in the Capitol halls on his way to the House Chambers. The Alaska Legislature met in a joint session at the Alaska State Capitol in Juneau to consider overriding Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s veto of an education funding bill. Lawmakers were one vote short of an override. (Marc Lester / ADN)

April 5. A white raven takes off from a light pole near Plato's Closet in Spenard in Anchorage. The leucistic raven, which has white feathers, a white beak and blue eyes, has been seen in Anchorage since October. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

April 11. Christine Smith, left, with her dog Bix, walks with Mary Anderson and her dog Bria on a blustery day at Storck Park in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

April 25. Former NYO athlete Alex Covey helped officiate the Toe Kick during the Native Youth Olympics Senior Games at the Alaska Airlines Center. (Bill Roth / ADN)

April 26. Flowers, photos and other mementos are left at the Christmas tree maintained by Jason Tolstrup near the Glenn and old Glenn Highways interchange near the Palmer Hayflats. Tolstrup was killed in an accident in Nevada earlier this week. (Anne Raup / ADN)

April 29. Mayor Dave Bronson and challenger Suzanne LaFrance ask each other questions during the debate hosted by the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce. (Marc Lester / ADN)

April 30. Michelle Goss and Bradley Heffinger expressed concern for their belongings and their broken vehicle before abatement began near Cuddy Park. (Marc Lester / ADN)

May 2. Black bears tumble and play near the JBER-Richardson gate along the Glenn Highway. (Bill Roth / ADN)

May 12. Souxath Xayasone swings his dipnet after scooping up a hooligan from the silty waters of Turnagain Arm. (Bill Roth / ADN)

May 14. Alissa Pili signs autographs after a WNBA game against the Seattle Storm at the Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle. The standout Dimond High graduate played her first regular season game after being drafted in the first round by the Minnesota Lynx. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

May 15. From left, Jamie Lockman, Dan Braden and Ignatius Tyson talked about homelessness while sitting in a tarp-covered tent on a hill above West Second Avenue near downtown Anchorage. (Bill Roth / ADN)

May 25. Marchers hold signs and chant on L Street in downtown Anchorage. Demonstrators called for Anchorage police to release body-worn camera footage of the shooting that killed Kristopher Handy on May 13. (Marc Lester / ADN)

May 28. Polar bear Kova extends her tongue through fencing at the Alaska Zoo in Anchorage. Kova came to the zoo as an orphan in 2022. (Marc Lester / ADN)

June 7. Feathers fly as Phillip Cadiente-Laiti-Blattner dances during Celebration, a Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian dance and culture festival in Juneau. The four-day festival is hosted by Sealaska Heritage Institute every two years. (Marc Lester / ADN)

June 12. A pair of trumpeter swans raising seven cygnets at Potter Marsh in the Anchorage Coastal Wildlife Refuge spent the afternoon feeding near the Seward Highway. (Bill Roth / ADN)

June 24. A pair of window washers cleans an office building in Midtown Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

June 19. A bald eagle dives for a fish carcass on the beach next to the Spring Creek campground in Seward. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

June 27. Bhai Subba, who is originally from Bhutan, rinses spinach that she sold during the World Refugee Day celebration at the Grow North Farm in Mountain View. (Bill Roth / ADN)

June 19. A wood bison calf is nudged by a cow in a field at UAF’s Large Animal Research Station. (Marc Lester / ADN)

July 4. Nat Gardner takes in a little sunshine while waiting for the Anchorage Fourth of July parade to begin. She restored her 1956 Ford F-100, which she has owned for almost 20 years. (Anne Raup / ADN)

July 4. A group of racers pile up near the end of a patch of snow near the top of the Mount Marathon race in Seward. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

July 4. Denali Strabel, left, congratulates her mom, Patricia Foldager, after she completed her 41st Mount Marathon race in Seward. Strabel also raced, placing sixth. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

July 8. Anchorage police investigate the scene of an officer-involved shooting off Bragaw Street. (Bill Roth / ADN)

July 18. Rosi Martinez Marthel pauses while stirring beans on the stove at Salsa Oaxaquena. (Anne Raup / ADN)

July 21. A young black bear strolls down a sidewalk in Government Hill. (Bill Roth / ADN)

July 25. Commercial fisherman Fred Thoerner prepares to anchor his set net to fish an incoming tide in the Northern District of Cook Inlet near Point MacKenzie. (Bill Roth / ADN)

July 25. Van Hale grabs a cup of coffee at the Marx Bros. Cafe. Hale is one of the founders of the restaurant and the sommelier. The longtime downtown restaurant closed this year. (Anne Raup / ADN)

July 31. Jay Rogers flips a yarn fly while fishing for coho (silver) salmon near an old Alaska Railroad timber trestle bridge, turned pedestrian bridge, that spans Ship Creek near downtown Anchorage. Rogers said the fishing was "slow and spotty." (Bill Roth / ADN)

August 5. A Nicrophorus investigator, a species of burying beetle, climbs tall grass on the Anchorage Hillside. Burying beetles are scavengers and feed on carcasses of birds and rodents, which they bury. (Marc Lester / ADN)

August 6. Martha Quinn takes her dog, Daisy, out for a walk in Juneau. Many of Quinn’s belongings are drying in front of the home she has lived in for 23 years, which was damaged by glacial outburst flooding that caused the Mendenhall River to swell. Quinn said it had been a difficult day, but she had a lot of help from friends and neighbors in response to the flooding and remains optimistic. “All the suffering that there is of such greater magnitude around the world, this is a drop in the bucket,” she said.

August 11. George Divoky releases an adult black guillemot after affixing a small data logging device on Cooper Island in the Arctic Ocean about 25 miles east of Utqiagvik. The device records sunrise and sunset times, and can help researchers determine where the birds overwinter. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

August 12. A young polar bear drops a nest box in an attempt to get black guillemot chicks on Cooper Island in the Arctic Ocean about 25 miles east of Utqiagvik, while its mother rests nearby. Polar bears are marine mammals, and their preferred food are seals, but climate change-caused sea ice decline has forced the bears to search for food on land. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

August 16. From left, Tammalivis Salanoa, Kiyana Ozn and Lornalei Suaava embrace during the gathering of about 100 people for a vigil for Easter Leafa on the Delaney Park Strip in downtown Anchorage. Leafa, 16, was shot and killed by police who said they were responding to a domestic disturbance on August 13. (Marc Lester / ADN)

August 11. Sandhill cranes gather at a farm near Palmer as they prepare to migrate. (Bill Roth / ADN)

August 12. Feathers stick to the beak of a sandhill crane. A pair of sandhill cranes has spent much of the summer in the yards of residential streets near Valley of the Moon Park in Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

August 22. Susanna Balsa, 19, of Anchorage had a goat nibble on her hair during Goat Yoga at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer. (Bill Roth / ADN)

August 25. Sheng Vue, 10, holds her "baby nephew," 8-month-old Jayce Vue, while participating in the Alaska Hmong New Year, a two-day celebration held at the Delaney Park Strip near downtown Anchorage. (Bill Roth / ADN)

August 26. Dale Marshall of Anchorage reacts to his Atlantic Giant pumpkin coming in at 2,035 pounds during the weigh-off at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer. (Bill Roth / ADN)

August 29. Rosy Fry, of Palmer, waits with her rabbit, Soot, to be judged. Contestants in the 4H rabbit showmanship competition presented their animals for judging in the barn at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer. Judge Kate Deering said she was looking for competitors to display their ability to handle their rabbits and well as demonstrate knowledge of their breeds. “There were some kids that knew a lot and they were very confident,” Deering said. “It took a while because there were so many.” (Marc Lester / ADN)

September 1. Tippy Top, a 7-year-old off the track thoroughbred, nudges Kyrie Cook, 12, at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer. "She is too sweet to be a race horse," said Cook. (Bill Roth / ADN)

September 4. A semi-truck sits in the water of Turnagain Arm north of Twentymile River near Anchorage. The truck was traveling the Seward Highway late on Tuesday and left the road, ending up in the waters of Turnagain Arm, police said. The truck’s driver suffered injuries described as not life-threatening, according to the Anchorage Police Department. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

September 5. Olympic bronze medal-winning rugby player Alev Kelter pauses her autograph session for a photo with Chugiak High School students. Chugiak High hosted the celebration for Kelter. (Marc Lester / ADN)

September 7. Morning sunlight highlights a spider web in the woods of Chugach National Forest near the Primrose Campground on the Kenai Peninsula. (Marc Lester / ADN)

September 13. Five-year-old Tika Anderson, left, and her sister Freya, 3, hug Dale Marshall’s giant pumpkin in West Anchorage. Marshall’s 2,035-pound entry won the giant pumpkin competition at this year’s Alaska State Fair. The girls enjoy walks with their family to see the giant gourd. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

September 17. Colorful clouds are reflected in Westchester Lagoon at sunrise. (Marc Lester / ADN)

September 17. Donna Gail Shaw watches birds from a bend in the North Fork of Campbell Creek in Far North Bicentennial Park in Anchorage. Shaw has a number of trail cameras set up along the creek, and she shares the wildlife images captured on her cameras with a few thousand people on Facebook. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

September 20. Special assistant on homelessness and health Farina Brown, photographed at City Hall, in Anchorage. Beside her is a picture frame holding photos of previous Anchorage mayors, which has not yet been updated with a photo of Mayor Suzanne LaFrance, the first woman elected as Anchorage's mayor. Austin Quinn-Davidson served as acting mayor following Ethan Berkowitz's resignation, but she chose not to run for a full term. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

September 20. A mushroom pops up in a lawn after a wet period of time. (Anne Raup / ADN)

September 21. Prada, a dog owned by Tonya Brewer, runs ahead of the 907 Barrel Racers' horses as they leave the arena after having a group portrait taken at the William Chamberlin Equestrian Center in Ruth Arcand Park. The group of mostly female horseback riders raced in the final members-only competition of the season. (Anne Raup / ADN)

September 21. Savannah Bayer maneuvers her horse Ninnah into the arena for the pole bending event at the William Chamberlin Equestrian Center in Ruth Arcand Park. (Anne Raup / ADN)

September 22. Mike Morris hooks a rainbow trout while fly fishing at Little Campbell Lake in Anchorage during the fall equinox. "This is such a beautiful time of year," said Morris. (Bill Roth / ADN)

September 26. Hotel Captain Cook bellman Ron Owen looks out from a window in Tower 2 of the hotel. Owen is retiring from work at the Captain Cook after 44 years of being an informal ambassador for the city. (Marc Lester / ADN)

September 29. David Clay gets big air off the whale tail feature during the grand opening of the Taku Lake Skatepark in South Anchorage. Clay is a former pro BMX rider who grew up in Anchorage and has traveled around the world doing bike demos. He said, "It's just really cool to see kids come out here with their parents, adults come out here after work, they keep the lights on, which is really nice. It's a beautiful place to be." (Bill Roth / ADN)

October 5. Bettye Davis East High's Katahdin Staples pulls away from the pack on his way to winning the ASAA/First National Bank Alaska Cross Country Running Division I State Championships at Bartlett High School in Anchorage. Staples's win earned the first title for a Thunderbirds boys runner since Don Clary in 1974. Clary, a legend on the track and trail, became the first Alaskan to compete in track and field at the Olympics. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

October 9. Natasha, an 11-year-old Amur tiger, explores her habitat at the Alaska Zoo. The tiger arrived this week from the Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita, Kansas. (Marc Lester / ADN)

October 13. Aloysius Unok, 72, center, drums with the Yup'ik dance group Ingrimiut Yuragtait during the 41st annual Statewide Elders & Youth Conference hosted by First Alaskans Institute. The theme of this year's conference "Our Land Our Food - We Are Living Our Indigenous Ways of Life." (Bill Roth / ADN)

October 14. Friends Kathleen Evon and Cataleya Johnson, both 12, fillet salmon during a fish cutting and pickling workshop during the First Alaskans Institute's Elders & Youth Conference at the Dena'ina Center. (Bill Roth / ADN)

October 17. Cecelia Pingayak Andrews performs with the Chevak Tanqik Dancers during the Alaska Federation of Natives convention at the Dena'ina Civic and Convention Center in Anchorage. Andrews is originally from Chevak and now lives in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

October 18. Angela and Brian Hall embrace during a visiting hours session at Wildwood Correctional Center. Brian had been in prison when they married 12 years ago. (Marc Lester / ADN)

October 22. Anchorage Police Department social work navigator Tanya Vandenbos and Officer Ruth Adolf visit Daniel Bartlett at his apartment. Bartlett moved into the apartment this month after about two years of living homeless. “They’ve been helping more than anybody else, because they’re the only ones willing to understand what I’ve been going through,” Bartlett said. Anchorage Police Department’s recently launched Homeless Outreach Prevention and Engagement team, or HOPE team, consists of a crisis intervention officer and a social work navigator. (Marc Lester / ADN)

October 25. President Joe Biden, reflected in a framed bunka shishu embroidery, delivers a televised address apologizing for federal Indian Boarding Schools at Eleanor Hadden's home in Anchorage. Hadden created the embroidery from a design created by her father. Hadden's great-aunt Mary Kininnook was one of nearly 200 children who died and were buried while students at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. Kininnook was 14 when she died in 1908, but due to improper record-keeping, she is one of 14 students whose remains are unidentified, buried under headstones marked "UNKNOWN." Hadden and her mother, who passed away four years ago, have been working for over half a century to get Kininnook's remains identified and returned to Alaska. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

October 26. Jamiann S’eiltin Hasselquist and Darlene McKinley listen as a Navy representative offers an official apology for the 1882 bombardment of Angoon. “So much relief,” McKinley said of her reaction to the apology. During the ceremony in Angoon, U.S. Navy officials issued a formal apology for a bombardment in 1882 that killed children and destroyed the village, food storehouses and dugout canoes. (Marc Lester / ADN)

October 29. Mark Dalton tosses snow from his driveway for Aspen, a dog he shares with a friend in Turnagain. “She loves the snow,” he said. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

November 4. Lake Hood Elementary third grader Victor Onumah, 9, was picked up by his mother Famatta Onumah after school. (Bill Roth / ADN)

November 5. A voter enters a booth with help from a light on a phone. Voters cast ballots at Tudor Elementary School during a power outage for less than an hour. Voters lined up in a dim hallway of Tudor Elementary School when voting began Tuesday as election workers checked them in and distributed ballots in the dark gym. A power outage in the neighborhood near Lake Otis Parkway and Waldron Drive added to the Election Day challenge for voters and poll workers. Voters cast their ballots aided by phone flashlights, headlamps and a few emergency lights. The line was about 75 people deep by 7:20 a.m. “We’re doing the best we can and we’ve got the field worker on the way to help us resolve the last-minute things,” said precinct chair Anna Hercha. Power was restored to the neighborhood at about 7:40 a.m. (Marc Lester / ADN)

November 5. Portia Erickson kisses her husband Alan as they wait for Nick Begich III, far left, to speak at a campaign event on election night, at the Marriott in downtown Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

November 5. State Reps. Andrew Gray and Genevieve Mina talk about election night results in an entryway outside Flattop Pizza in downtown Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

November 8. 15-year-old student Yemeni student Ahmed Alhezami works on his English skills in an English Language Learner class at West Anchorage High School. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

November 11. World War II veterans Louis "Jiggs" Gigliotti, 103, and Gordon Severson, 94, who was awarded the Purple Heart Medal four times and a Bronze Star with Valor during the Korean War and served in Vietnam, share a moment after a Veterans Day ceremony at the Alaska National Guard armory on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson. (Bill Roth / ADN)

November 15. A rabbit crosses a parking lot outside Aquarian Charter School. (Marc Lester / ADN)

November 17. As the moon rises, crowds of people gather on the mudflats along the Anchorage coast to see the carcass of a fin whale that recently came to rest there. (Marc Lester / ADN)

November 17. Ice coats baleen in the mouth of a fin whale that came to rest on the frozen mudflats of Cook Inlet near Anchorage. (Bill Roth / ADN)

November 18. A woman touches the tip of the dead fin whale fluke. (Bill Roth / ADN)

November 18. A deceased 47-foot fin whale lies on the frozen mudflats near the mouth of Fish Creek in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

November 19. A visitor casts a shadow on the fin whale carcass on the mudflats near Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

November 25. Two bull moose spar and push each other in an East Anchorage neighborhood. (Anne Raup / ADN)

November 27. UAA culinary arts student Tia Patrick, left, touches up icing while associate professor Kellie Puff and student Jalen Frederick position a gingerbread tree in a gingerbread village in the lobby of the Hotel Captain Cook in downtown Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)

December 1. Vincent John Wulf, who said he has been homeless about five years, places wood from a pallet into a warming barrel burning at Town Square Park. (Bill Roth / ADN)

December 2. The 300-foot-wide star on Mount Gordon Lyon on the eastern edge of Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson is visible high above the Anchorage skyline after sunset. (Bill Roth / ADN)

December 5. Afternoon sunlight is filtered by fog at Goose Lake Park in Anchorage. (Marc Lester / ADN)

December 8. A northbound Alaska Railroad passenger train rolls past Beluga Point along the Turnagain Arm during a holiday charter to Indian. Christmas lights and wreaths illuminated both 4,000 horsepower diesel locomotives, one on each end of the train. (Bill Roth / ADN)

Loren Holmes

Loren Holmes is a staff photojournalist at the Anchorage Daily News. Contact him at loren@adn.com.

Bill Roth

Bill Roth is a staff photojournalist at the Anchorage Daily News.

Marc Lester

Marc Lester is a multimedia journalist for Anchorage Daily News. Contact him at mlester@adn.com.

Anne Raup

Multimedia editor Anne Raup has been with ADN for 26 years, both as a staff shooter and an editor.