The other Alaska airlift: Volunteers save dogs from a flooded Alaska village, 1 tiny plane at a time

SEATTLE (AP) — The special delivery arrived in a plastic storage box after a chartered flight in bouncy single-propeller plane. Veterinarian Susan Shaffer Sookram snipped the zip ties securing the lid and greeted the cargo: four dogs, one with a gray collar bearing its name, Happy.

“What a scary ride!” she said. “You made it!”

As officials in Alaska work around the clock on one of the most significant airlift operations in state history — evacuating more than 1,000 people from remote, flood-battered villages on the coast of the Bering Sea — another rescue operation is playing out: getting the dogs left behind to safety, in hopes of later reuniting them with their owners.

The pet shelters closest to the devastated villages are in Bethel, a regional hub around 90 miles (150 kilometers) aw