Mother of all storms pounding Alaska's western coast as some residents flee destruction.

Courtesy of Fairbanks NewsMiner:

High winds and surging waves pummeled Alaska's western coast Wednesday, churning the Bering Sea and forcing residents of Nome and isolated Native villages to seek higher ground inland. 

"We do have some reports of buildings losing roofs in the Nome area," said meteorologist Scott Berg at the National Weather Service in Fairbanks. "Also water at the base of buildings in Nome." 

Nome resident Gigi Carpenter Immingan told relatives this morning that emergency managers closed East Front Street. 

"The storm has tossed debris onto the roadway creating hazardous driving conditions. In addition, waves are launching fist-sized rocks and logs up to 2 feet in diameter onto the road way," Immingan's Facebook post said. "These objects would cause injury to any person that was struck. These signs of beach erosion indicate that the Nome-Council highway is impassible." 

Winds were blowing roofing material off building, creating further hazards, she said. 

Communications officer Zane Brown said the height of snow and hurricane-force winds hit at about 2 a.m. He said a voluntary evacuation has moved residents from beachfront businesses and homes to shelters at a community center and a church. 

Apparently this monster is just getting started, and already some communities are in serious trouble.

As you can see in the above map their are numerous villages, some of them with only a small community of a hundred or so people, in the path of the storm.  Getting rescue workers and medical aid to these communities in case of a bad outcome will be problematic at best.

Like I said before there are no heartier people on earth, but there has not been a storm like this in almost fifty years.

Here is some footage from Nome, Alaska just to give you some idea of what these people are dealing with right now.