Suspect in custody after report of gunfire closes Seward Highway

An Anchorage man was in custody Monday after threatening people along the Seward Highway with a handgun and hammer and firing off shots before fleeing into the woods, according to Alaska State Troopers.

Nathaniel R. Smith, 37, was charged with four counts of third-degree assault, reckless driving, misconduct involving a weapon and fourth-degree criminal mischief in the incident, which closed down the Seward Highway between Girdwood and the Kenai Peninsula for several hours.

Nobody was injured in the incident, and the highway reopened fully around 1 p.m., troopers spokesperson Megan Peters wrote in an email.

Around 8 a.m. Monday, troopers received a report of a pickup truck driving erratically near Portage. By about 8:10 a.m., calls were coming in that a man with a handgun and hammer was threatening people along the roadway, and that he'd fired shots.

Aaron Mendive told Alaska Dispatch News he was on his way to work at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center, near Portage, around 8 a.m. when a man near a stopped car flagged him down as he approached the Twentymile River bridge.

Mendive, who works in maintenance at the center, said the man told him that someone who had just left in a vehicle had been spotted on the bridge waving a gun.

Mendive then headed toward the Conservation Center to alert staff and make sure the person, who he'd been told was driving south, wasn't on center property.

Mike Miller, the center's executive director, said staff took refuge at his home on the property Monday morning. The center was closed during the incident but reopened around noon.

Jennifer Gray, who is visiting Alaska from Virginia, was heading to Seward Monday when she was similarly flagged down near Twentymile River, and told there was someone on the bridge waving a gun.

Gray eventually continued on her way after being told the man had headed south in a black pickup truck. She stopped at the "Welcome to the Kenai Peninsula" sign to take a picture around 8:30 a.m.

She went back to her car. Then she saw a vehicle heading toward her.

"I saw, coming toward me northbound again, just this car that was weaving all over. Like, in 30 years I've been driving, I've never seen anybody weaving and carrying on like that," Gray said. She realized it was a black pickup truck.

"Of course I was scared to death, and sort of put it in drive, and as he drove past me I just stepped on it," Gray said.

At some point Smith crashed the black Ford Ranger he was driving, troopers said, which came to rest upside-down on the side of the road between miles 76 and 77 of the highway. Smith fled into the woods following the crash, according to troopers.

Officers worked to establish a perimeter around the area. Troopers and officers with the Anchorage Police Department and Whittier Police Department responded to the incident, along with special emergency response teams from both Soldotna and Palmer, and Alaska Wildlife Troopers.

Troopers called Smith's cellphone, and he answered.

"Smith had become lost and wet after fleeing into the woods," a trooper dispatch said. Troopers guided him back to the highway, where he was arrested without incident.

Smith was in custody by about 10:45 a.m., police said.

He was taken to an Anchorage hospital for evaluation, since he had crashed his vehicle and was exposed to the cold. He would be taken to the Anchorage Correctional Complex after his release, the dispatch says.

Smith was expected to be arraigned Tuesday afternoon, wrote Anchorage District Attorney Clint Campion.

This is the second time in April that the Seward Highway has closed due to police activity.

On April 5, the highway was shut down for about 12 hours after a man, later identified as 36-year-old Kevin Thibodeau, reportedly threatened a person at Beluga Point with a handgun. Thibodeau's body was discovered a few days later in the water nearby.

Alaska Dispatch News reporter Suzanna Caldwell and photographer Bill Roth contributed to this report.