ANCHORAGE — The Air Force is replacing handles that engage the F-22 Raptor fighter jet’s emergency oxygen system after pilots reported feeling lightheaded and the death of a captain whose $143 million aircraft took a nosedive into a mountain range in Alaska.

Capt. Jeffrey Haney was killed in November 2010 during a night mission about 100 miles north of Anchorage. An accident investigation found that the plane’s controls and switches contributed to the crash, particularly an emergency oxygen system activation ring on the back edge of the ejection seat.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Aliy Zirkle was once held up as being the Iditarod’s best chance for becoming the sled dog race’s first female champion in two decades, and the 41-year-old musher’s time may finally have come.

With roughly two-thirds of the nearly 1,000-mile race across Alaska left to go Saturday, Zirkle, of Two Rivers, held a strong lead thanks to strategy that put a checkpoint between herself and her competitors.

ANCHORAGE — A former aide to U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski who had worked as a commercial fisherman while sitting on the council that regulates fishing off Alaska’s coastline was sentenced Tuesday to five months in prison for falsifying his own fishing reports.

ANCHORAGE — Two major highways south of Anchorage were closed for the majority of the day on Thursday as crews removed snow and debris and used military-style cannons to bring down potentially dangerous avalanches.

An avalanche shut down both directions of the Seward Highway about 7 a.m. at its juncture with the Sterling Highway, the Alaska Department of Transportation said. The slide was estimated to be between 3 and 10 feet deep and 100 feet wide, considered a small to medium-sized avalanche.