Alaska: Thanksgiving by the numbers
Around the United States, Thanksgiving is a time of food, friends and family.
In Alaska, it’s no different. Alaska is a state of great wealth, but also great need. Thousands of Alaskans rely on food stamps and other social services to get them through the holidays. But along the way, there are few traditions that keep Alaska unique — from whale being served on Alaska’s North Slope or cranberry “superfood” that will find its way on to many Alaskans’ tables Thursday.
Let’s run down some of those numbers and traditions for Thanksgiving in Alaska:
• 2,500: Estimated total number of calories in a Thanksgiving meal
• 106,200: Number of Alaskans designated as food-insecure
• 37,640: Number of Alaska children considered food-insecure
• 10,001: Number of meals the Food Bank of Alaska distributed in Anchorage and the Mat-Su this week
• 9,395: Number of meals distributed in 2012
• 1,100: Number of meals distributed by the Fairbanks Food Bank
• 58,000: Pounds of food distributed by the Fairbanks Food Bank
• 1,330: Pounds of turkey served at Bean’s Cafe Thursday
• 40: Gallons of gravy
• 97: Number of pies served
• 1,200: People eating at Bean’s
• 27 feet: The length and width of Barrow’s “butterball” bowhead whale harvested last month
• 10: Whales brought in by the Alaska North Slope communities of Kaktovik, Nuiqsut and Wainwright
• 70s: Oxygen Radical Absorption Capacity, or antioxidant capacity, of Alaska low-bush cranberries being served in some Alaska cranberry sauces
• 13 inches: Snow at the base of Mount Alyeska on opening day on Thanksgiving
• 30 inches: Snow at the top
• 13,000 to 14,000: Average number of passengers traveling on the day before Thanksgiving at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, well below an average summer day of 20,000
• 6 hours 16 minutes: Hours of Thanksgiving daylight in Anchorage:
• 4 hours 55 minutes: Hours of Thanksgiving daylight in Fairbanks
• Zero: Minutes of Thanksgiving daylight in Barrow
