SITKA -- Rescue crews Friday raced against a looming weather front expected to hit late in the day, hoping to recover the body of city building official William Stortz, 62, the only one of three victims of Tuesday's deadly landslide who has not yet been found.
But Friday evening, the search had to be suspended for the weekend because of the weather, and rain began falling late in the day as the workers and heavy equipment were pulled out of the Kramer Avenue area.
Three days of clear weather had allowed searchers to recover the bodies of Elmer Diaz, 26, and Ulises Diaz, 25, the other two men who died after intense rainfall Tuesday triggered a massive landslide. Their bodies were found Wednesday and Thursday and officially identified Friday.
Work at the slide site resumed at first light Friday as they tried to beat the incoming weather.
"We've got a very small window, and it is closing rapidly on us, said Al Stevens, incident commander and assistant chief of the Sitka Fire Department, Friday afternoon.
The nearly three days of clear weather allowed the sodden soil to drain, reducing the risk of new slides.
But National Weather Service meteorologist Joel Curtis warned that more heavy rains are coming. He said they're expected to hit Friday evening and take a break early Saturday before coming down hard again later Saturday and through the weekend.
Curtis was in Sitka serving as incident meteorologist during the recovery effort, giving workers on the unstable slide area up-to-the-minute weather forecasts.
Curtis said the new storms approaching Sitka may carry as much rain as the Tuesday storm that caused at least six landslides around the city, but will be fundamentally different.
"The main difference to the event we had Tuesday morning was the fact that this rainfall will be spread out over 36-48 hours," he said. On Tuesday, 2.57 inches of rain were measured in six hours at Sitka's Rocky Gutierrez Airport.
And Curtis said there's a credible report from a rain gauge closer to the slide of 5 inches, and the rainfall was likely higher still on Harbor Mountain above the slide, where there are no rain gauges.
After consulting with geologists, Stevens decided to pull out the search teams and equipment and issued a voluntary evacuation notice for some nearby neighborhoods where residents had only recently been able to return home.
Mitch McDonald, an engineering geologist for the Department of Transportation, warned that serious risk remains, especially with loose material and newly exposed soil at the main slide area.
But he said the opportunity for the soil to drain during the last few days will help reduce risks.
In addition to searching, the crews have also been cutting new drainage ditches and opening blocked culverts to minimize future slides.
Stevens said elsewhere in the city progress has been made as well, and limited access to the city's Blue Lake dam had been regained. The dam infrastructure appears to have suffered no damage.
One of Tuesday's landslides in Sitka's Sawmill Cove Industrial Park, where Silver Bay Seafoods is, damaged a building being used as a bunkhouse to house 30-40 workers.
Seafood processor James Glidden said he was asleep in the bunkhouse when the building was hit at 9 a.m.
"I heard a very loud rumble, like an explosion, I guess you could call it," he said. "Everybody started running around yelling."
There were no injuries, but the building was damaged and has not yet been reopened.
The company found alternate housing for the employees that night, but most have since left Sitka as their season ended.