She was there because she’d run out of whiskey, and not because she’d been serving it to guests. Her drinking was no longer a problem. Sergeant Jim Chopin of the Alaska State Troopers wouldn’t have minded so much except that on her way out of the liquor store’s parking lot she’d T-boned a 1994 Dodge Stratus four-door sedan with a mother, two children and a set of grandparents inside. The grandfather was DOA. The thirteen-year old had a chance if the medivac chopper made it to the hospital in Ahtna in time. The rest of the living were on their way to the hospital via ground transportation and the dead were in body bags when the second call came in. Another accident, this one about halfway between Tok and the Ahtna turnoff to the Park. A 43-year old man driving a 1995 Toyota 4Runner had collided with a 19-year old man driving a 2001 Ski-Doo snowmachine. The snowmachine driver had been on his way to visit his girlfriend in Glenallen, and from the tracks at the scene had been operating his vehicle along the side of the road as he was supposed to, until he came to the Eagle Creek Bridge.
