The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers-Alaska District 

The Alaska District is a full-service district with three major programs: military construction, civil works, and environmental cleanup and restoration. It also has significant programs in contracting, operations and maintenance, real estate and regulatory activities. Its programs are highly visible in the military and local communities and are deep-seated in Alaskan history. It has extensive expertise in cold regions engineering. The district's work force assists military, federal, local and tribal entities with planning, engineering, construction, contracting, real estate, emergency operations and regulatory projects. The district supports the Overseas Contingency Operations and supports the nation in natural disaster response. District staff are helping provide humanitarian assistance in Asia and supporting the foreign military sales program.

District Fast Facts

The Alaska District provides a full range of quality engineering, technical and construction support services in support of peacetime and contingency operations in Alaska and throughout the Pacific region.

  • The district was established on April 9, 1946.
  • Headquarters is located on the Elmendorf side of Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson on the northern border of Anchorage, Alaska.
  • We are responsible for the largest geographic area in the nation.
    • One-fifth the size of America’s lower 48 states
    • 33,904 miles of coastline
    • 15 million miles of potentially navigable waterways
    • 43 percent of state is wetlands
    • 220 million acres of wetlands and other waters
  • We are winding down from our largest-ever military program, which was one of the biggest in the Corps of Engineers.
  • Our major programs focus on military construction, civil works and environmental cleanup.
    • Military construction projects, once accounting for the largest portion of the district's workload, are declining while other programs, such as humanitarian assistance to Asia and foreign military sales, are increasing.
    • Our civil works program operates and maintains 52 river and navigation projects along the coast of Alaska. Of these projects, 36 are small boat harbors, 10 are channels, four are breakwaters and two are river projects.
    • Our formerly used defense sites program has identified 312 environmental cleanup and restoration projects within the state. To date, 132 projects have been completed.

We are committed to supporting Overseas Contingency Operations by constructing quality facilities for servicemembers and their families in Alaska. In addition, more than 70 members of our work force have volunteered for assignments in Iraq and Afghanistan.