Anchorage police clear MacInnes and 36th Avenue scene, leave patrol units for follow-up

The Anchorage Police Department said Tuesday evening that the scene at MacInnes Street and 36th Avenue was clear and there was no longer a large police presence there. Some patrol units stayed for follow-up work.

APD has not said what the investigation involved and has not released information on arrests or injuries.

The department first posted its notice at 5:14 pm Nov. 3. It asked people to avoid the area during what it called an ongoing investigation and to follow officer instructions if they had to be there.

The alert said the response "may require using a variety of tactics and tools, to include the drone." APD has used that same sentence in large-police-presence notices since at least December 2024, according to a 2024 department notice.

The department filed Tuesday's notice under its drone deployment category. The notice does not say whether a drone was actually used.

APD has said it set up that category so the public is notified when a drone is used during a call. A Sept. 16 department notice said the category had been added recently so the public could easily find drone deployments, "thus the reason there are more of these notifications."

A log of APD drone flights from May 2022 to April 2026, provided to the Anchorage Assembly, shows the department frequently used drones for SWAT callouts involving barricaded suspects. It also used them to document serious and fatal crashes and to map homicide scenes.