Amy Martin: 00:00:00

Hey, it's Amy. I want to let you know that we're

Amy Martin: 00:00:02

doing something a little different this time. We just had

Amy Martin: 00:00:05

so much content that felt important to share in this

Amy Martin: 00:00:08

episode that it grew to almost an hour, and then that felt like

Amy Martin: 00:00:12

kind of a lot, so we made this a two-parter. It's one episode

Amy Martin: 00:00:16

telling one part of the story of the refuge, but we've divided it

Amy Martin: 00:00:19

into two pieces. That's all thanks for listening.

Nick Mott: 00:00:24

This series was supported by the Pulitzer

Nick Mott: 00:00:26

Center.

Nick Mott: 00:00:29

Kathy Itta-Ahgeak: Well, we know, we know who we are, right?

Nick Mott: 00:00:31

We're Inupiaq. Well, you know where that word comes from, the

Nick Mott: 00:00:34

word inuk.

Amy Martin: 00:00:35

This is Kathy Itta-Ahgeak. I'm talking with

Amy Martin: 00:00:37

her in the Inupiat Heritage Center in Utqiagvik, Alaska.

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Kathy was the director of the center when we met.

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Kathy Itta-Ahgeak: and the word inuk is a person. It comes from

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the word inu, to live. So we are living people. But in addition

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to that, we add piaq, which means real. So we are the real

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people.

Amy Martin: 00:00:58

Welcome to Threshold, I'm Amy Martin, and

Amy Martin: 00:01:01

this is season three of our show. We're exploring the

Amy Martin: 00:01:04

40-year battle over drilling for oil in the Arctic National

Amy Martin: 00:01:07

Wildlife Refuge. My conversation with Kathy wasn't about that

Amy Martin: 00:01:11

controversy, though. It was about Inupiaq language and

Amy Martin: 00:01:15

culture.

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Kathy Itta-Ahgeak: And our food is niqipiaq, the word niqi, it's

Amy Martin: 00:01:20

food. Niqsaq is to get food. And we add to our Native food, we

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call it niqipiaq. Real food. So we are real people eating real

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food. Maybe once upon a time, there were imaginary things and

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we had to know what's real.

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The Inupiat are part of the Inuit family of cultures.

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Inuit territory stretches from eastern Russia across the

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northern part of Alaska and the enormous Canadian Arctic and all

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the way over to Greenland. If drilling moves forward in the

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refuge, it'll be happening on ancestral Inupiaq lands. Kathy

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says there's a lot of diversity among all the different Inuit

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communities, but also many common values and traditions.

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And one of those values she told me about has been looping in my

Amy Martin: 00:02:12

brain as I've been reporting on drilling in the refuge. It's

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called atauchikun.

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Kathy Itta-Ahgeak: Atauchikun is together and everything has to

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be in harmony and together, be of the same mind. Atauchikun

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comes from the word a doubt. A doubt is to be underneath, like

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a foundation. Yeah.

Amy Martin: 00:02:33

Oh, interesting. So, like the foundation is

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togetherness.

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No matter where human beings live, we have to try to get

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along with each other. But here, in one of the harshest

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environments on the planet, community cohesion isn't just a

Amy Martin: 00:02:49

nice goal, it's a life or death survival skill. In the middle of

Amy Martin: 00:02:53

an Arctic winter, you can't just get angry and leave your

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community all by yourself, or you can, but you'll probably

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die. Inupiaq people have survived here for thousands of

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years by figuring out how to keep working together no matter

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what. Hunting together, sewing together, preserving food

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together. And Kathy says this ethic of atauchikun is still

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deeply ingrained in the culture and reinforced in all kinds of

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ways, like through one of the signature Inupiaq games, called

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the blanket toss. This is where dozens of people hold the edges

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of a seal skin blanket and toss a jumper in the middle, high up

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into the air.

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Kathy Itta-Ahgeak: When we're doing the blanket toss and we're

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tossing a jumper, somebody elder will tell us, atauchikun! Go

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together! You know, we have to go together. We have to throw

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the blanket together, and even in the hunting, we have to work

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together. So I think that is probably one of the best

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characteristics that we have, that we could share, is that,

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you know, the love and respect for one another and working

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together.

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So why has atauchikun been on my mind so

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much while working on this series about the refuge? Well,

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I've been producing this at a time when the United States as a

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whole is extremely divided. Drilling in the refuge is just

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one of many hot button family dinner ruining, polarizing

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issues in our country right now. And I've been wondering, how

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does this kind of stuff play out in an Inupiaq context? How are

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people holding on to these values of togetherness and

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harmony when they disagree? Because people do disagree about

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drilling in the refuge, not just people who live in faraway

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places, Inupiaq, people. People who live right next to where the

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drilling might be. So what happens when the values of unity

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and community cohesion come into conflict with other fundamental

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values like caring for land and water and animals? How do any of

Amy Martin: 00:04:58

us work together and stay strong together, even when we

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vehemently, passionately disagree? These are some of the

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defining questions of American life right now, and they're also

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the questions people are grappling with in the Inupiaq

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village of Kaktovik, Alaska.

Robert Thompson: 00:05:15

I could be here and see the last polar bear in

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Alaska.

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Nora Jane Burns: We're melting rapidly along the coast. The

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weather's getting weird.

Fenton Rexford: 00:05:25

Kaktovik is the only community within the

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boundaries of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. We are

Fenton Rexford: 00:05:31

not an exhibit in a museum.

Unknown: 00:05:33

It's a big opportunity that we be able to profit off

Unknown: 00:05:37

of.

Unknown: 00:05:38

Nora Jane Burns: No, I'm sorry. I'm not going to be quiet

Unknown: 00:05:40

anymore. I'm going to start wasting my concerns and my

Unknown: 00:05:44

opinions.

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The first time Nora Jane Burns remembers being aware

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of injustice was when she was in kindergarten in the 1960s. She

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grew up in Kaktovik, Alaska, a village of close to 300 people

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located on an island just north of the coastal plain of the

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Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. And she remembers being pretty

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shocked at how her classmates were being treated at school.

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Nora Jane Burns: Every time some kid did something, they would

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get whacked and stuff like that. And, you know, like, if they

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just say an Eskimo word, like, if you drop your pencil, oh, my

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pencil, karuq. And then, you know, we say the word karuq the

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teacher was fast to whack us on our hands or whatever, so that

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we wouldn't speak our language. And that's the first time ever

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seen anything happen like that.

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Nora Jane's father was a teacher in that same

Amy Martin: 00:06:34

school. In fact, the school is named after him now, and he had

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told her before she started kindergarten that if she didn't

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understand something, she should just raise her hand and ask

Amy Martin: 00:06:43

about it. So she did.

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Nora Jane Burns: And I think I over raised my hands to that

Amy Martin: 00:06:47

poor teacher, and she didn't like me at all because I'd asked

Amy Martin: 00:06:51

why we have to do it this way? How come we have to do it that

Amy Martin: 00:06:55

way? Isn't there another way to do it, you know?

Amy Martin: 00:06:58

Quick side note, that's Nora Jane's little dog

Amy Martin: 00:07:00

barking in the background. Anyway, she says her teacher got

Amy Martin: 00:07:04

frustrated with her and her best friend.

Amy Martin: 00:07:06

Nora Jane Burns: She told our older sisters that that we were

Amy Martin: 00:07:09

both dumb, that we're not going to learn anything, and then it

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just went downhill.

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The teacher just stopped teaching Nora Jane.

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Nora Jane Burns: She didn't know World War Three was going to

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happen after that, so I made it miserable for her rest of the

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school year.

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How did you make it miserable?

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Nora Jane Burns: Just do all kinds of crazy things that the

Amy Martin: 00:07:28

kid would do to disrupt her from teaching the other guys. I say,

Amy Martin: 00:07:32

if you going to teach those guys, yeah? And then not me? My

Amy Martin: 00:07:36

kind of thinking, anyway.

Amy Martin: 00:07:37

So you had a little bit of a rebellious streak?

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Nora Jane Burns: Yeah, I think from day one.

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Nora Jane went on to college and later served as the

Amy Martin: 00:07:46

mayor of Kaktovik for many years, and she says she

Amy Martin: 00:07:50

developed the confidence she needed to stand up for herself

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and be a community leader by being out on the land with her

Amy Martin: 00:07:56

family.

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Nora Jane Burns: Yes, growing up, my father would take us out,

Amy Martin: 00:08:01

you know, after school was out in June, and when we're able to

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boat, he'd take us to our family camp at Jago.

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The Jago is one of the rivers that runs north out

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of the Brooks Range and across the 1002 area, the part of the

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refuge where drilling has now been approved. Nora Jane says

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her dad taught her how to use a small bow and arrow when they

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were camped over there, even though some of the boys her age

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said girls couldn't hunt.

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Nora Jane Burns: So he had an ice cellar over there, and

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that's where he would put our caribou that we harvest during

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the summer. He'd get enough to last us a whole, all winter,

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because he was a teacher and he couldn't go hunting during the

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week like the other guys when they're not working and stuff,

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so he'd have whole bunch of caribou in the ice cellar. And

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then on weekends, when he was off, he would go out, and it

Amy Martin: 00:08:48

would be an all day trip for him just to go out there and go get

Amy Martin: 00:08:51

the caribou out of the ice cellar.

Amy Martin: 00:08:53

Like he'd take the snowmobile out?

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Nora Jane Burns: No, he had dog teams.

Amy Martin: 00:08:59

When she was a child, Nora Jane, had to walk a

Amy Martin: 00:09:01

ways inland to get to the ice cellar. But lack of sea ice has

Amy Martin: 00:09:05

ramped up the erosion of many parts of the Alaska shoreline,

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and now, like so many other culturally important sites in

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coastal Alaska, the family ice cellar has been swallowed by the

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sea.

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What do you think about climate change?

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Nora Jane Burns: It's happening. We're melting rapidly along the

Amy Martin: 00:09:23

coast. And I know it's happening. You watch the

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seasons, the weather's getting weird.

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The snow used to start falling in August or

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September, she says. But now sometimes the island is still

Amy Martin: 00:09:38

getting rain in October.

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Nora Jane Burns: Even when I fish I had told my cousin, hey,

Amy Martin: 00:09:43

my hands never get cold when I was checking my fish net in July

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and August, I said, your fingertips should have been

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really cold when you're checking your fish net and stuff like

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that. And they said, my hands didn't get even cold.

Amy Martin: 00:09:56

Is the sea ice different?

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Nora Jane Burns: Yeah, there's no sea ice. When I was growing

Amy Martin: 00:10:02

up, we'd have ice flows out there that you can go out seal

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hunting and, and last how many years we haven't really seen

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any. And I just wonder what are happening to the seals out there

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if there's no ice for them to lay and rest, you know, and it's

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affecting the polar bears too. So whatever affects the seals,

Amy Martin: 00:10:27

it affects the polar bears and the fish. So, yeah.

Amy Martin: 00:10:31

What do you think is causing climate change?

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Nora Jane Burns: I have no idea. It's just happening.

Amy Martin: 00:10:37

You don't necessarily think it's fossil

Amy Martin: 00:10:38

fuels?

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Nora Jane Burns: That could be a factor. And I was hearing the

Amy Martin: 00:10:42

rainforest being chopped off because they helped clean out

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the atmosphere and stuff like that, so.

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Nora Jane worked in the Prudhoe Bay oil field as a

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summer job when she was in college, picking up trash and

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doing other odd jobs. And when she first heard about the

Amy Martin: 00:10:58

possibility of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge,

Amy Martin: 00:11:02

she was for it.

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Nora Jane Burns: When I was young in my early 20s, thought

Amy Martin: 00:11:06

that was good because it would provide jobs.

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She got married and moved back to Kaktovik in 1988.

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Nora Jane Burns: Then I was still for it, but then I became

Amy Martin: 00:11:16

a planning commissioner.

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That position gave her an insider's view of

Amy Martin: 00:11:20

development decisions on the North Slope, and that's when her

Amy Martin: 00:11:24

opinion on drilling in the refuge started to change.

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Nora Jane Burns: Just from watching how the oil companies

Amy Martin: 00:11:29

get their permits, they always say they're going to start just

Amy Martin: 00:11:33

in this area. They say they'll start here, but then they'll

Amy Martin: 00:11:36

spider off over here. You know, every other season seems like

Amy Martin: 00:11:41

just from watching that and then just from getting older and

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wanting healthy animals to eat.

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Nora Jane says she's heard from people in other

Amy Martin: 00:11:50

villages close to oil fields that the fish and the caribou

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aren't as healthy as they are around Kaktovik, and she says

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people in those places have to travel much farther to hunt to

Amy Martin: 00:12:01

get away from the noise and lights of the oil industry.

Amy Martin: 00:12:04

Nora Jane Burns: Why would we want to have Prudhoe Bay? You

Amy Martin: 00:12:07

see all the oil rigs and stuff, and it's not fancy stuff.

Amy Martin: 00:12:11

She's also very concerned about the possibility

Amy Martin: 00:12:14

of an oil spill. And she's not alone. The fear of a major oil

Amy Martin: 00:12:17

spill in this remote, hard to reach area has been raised by

Amy Martin: 00:12:21

many people. Even the very first step in a cleanup would be

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problematic. The large equipment needed would have to be shipped

Amy Martin: 00:12:28

in, and the refuge is a long way from any major ports. Nora Jane

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says she's brought things like this up in many meetings, and

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the pro oil people try to reassure her by saying that a

Amy Martin: 00:12:38

spill is unlikely and that would be cleaned up quickly.

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Nora Jane Burns: I said, you can assure us, A, B and C, but

Amy Martin: 00:12:45

listen, you guys are not gods. You guys cannot prevent any oil

Amy Martin: 00:12:51

spill on the ground, and it takes forever to clean up and to

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get rid of the contamination. We're in a cycle. They forget

Amy Martin: 00:13:01

that the water comes from the ocean and it comes back around

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and it's, it's a circle of life.

Amy Martin: 00:13:08

If you heard our last episode when we talked to

Amy Martin: 00:13:10

people in Kaktovik who support oil development, you might be

Amy Martin: 00:13:13

thinking, but what about the money? What about the ways that

Amy Martin: 00:13:17

drilling for oil and the refuge could help people in Kaktovik?

Amy Martin: 00:13:20

Would you personally benefit from it?

Amy Martin: 00:13:22

Nora Jane Burns: Well, well, I'm ASRC shareholder for one, and so

Amy Martin: 00:13:26

I'll benefit just a little bit, but even, but I'd rather have

Amy Martin: 00:13:31

healthy food, healthy caribou, healthy land. Birds, you have

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birds that fly in and out, and you don't want them to be dying

Amy Martin: 00:13:41

off and stuff like that, and even our ocean water, we have to

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be careful with that too.

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ASRC stands for the Arctic Slope Regional

Amy Martin: 00:13:53

Corporation, one of the native corporations we talked about in

Amy Martin: 00:13:56

our last episode. It's become a powerful force on the pro oil

Amy Martin: 00:14:00

side, along with the North Slope Borough. Boroughs are like

Amy Martin: 00:14:04

counties in Alaska, but the North Slope Borough is so big,

Amy Martin: 00:14:07

it's really more like a state within the state. It's roughly

Amy Martin: 00:14:10

the size of Wyoming, but with fewer than 10,000 permanent

Amy Martin: 00:14:14

residents. The Prudhoe Bay oil field, the National Petroleum

Amy Martin: 00:14:18

Reserve and a big chunk of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Amy Martin: 00:14:22

are contained within its borders. Jobs can be hard to

Amy Martin: 00:14:26

come by on the North Slope, and the Borough is a major employer.

Amy Martin: 00:14:30

In 2015, 48% of North Slope residents worked directly for

Amy Martin: 00:14:35

the Borough government or for the North Slope School District,

Amy Martin: 00:14:38

and those jobs, like almost everything on the North Slope,

Amy Martin: 00:14:42

are funded by taxes from oil and gas development. So if a North

Amy Martin: 00:14:47

Slope person wants to speak out against oil development, they

Amy Martin: 00:14:51

risk going up against their employer, their government and

Amy Martin: 00:14:55

the oil and gas industry. This creates a certain kind of

Amy Martin: 00:14:59

atmosphere. One that several people I spoke to in different

Amy Martin: 00:15:03

communities in Alaska described as intimidating. It's hard to

Amy Martin: 00:15:08

speak your mind if you feel like you might lose your job, and it

Amy Martin: 00:15:12

also makes it hard to talk to reporters. People who feel like

Amy Martin: 00:15:15

they've faced retaliation from the Borough because of their

Amy Martin: 00:15:18

opinions have little to gain and a whole lot to lose by sharing

Amy Martin: 00:15:22

their stories. Nora Jane says, here in the village, everyone

Amy Martin: 00:15:27

pretty much knows where everyone else stands on oil, and she

Amy Martin: 00:15:30

knows some people have been really mad at her for speaking

Amy Martin: 00:15:33

out against it.

Amy Martin: 00:15:34

Does it make you uncomfortable in your community to be a little

Amy Martin: 00:15:38

bit of a rebel like this?

Amy Martin: 00:15:39

Nora Jane Burns: Shoot, I've been fighting all my life.

Amy Martin: 00:15:43

Ever since you were that kindergartner!

Amy Martin: 00:15:46

Nora Jane Burns: Yeah! No, sometimes it hurts a little bit,

Amy Martin: 00:15:49

but to say, well, they have their own mind, and I have my

Amy Martin: 00:15:53

own mind, so I'll, I'll keep thinking the way I want to

Amy Martin: 00:15:57

think, and they can keep thinking the way they want to

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think. And if we talk about it, we can get all angry and stuff,

Amy Martin: 00:16:06

but then in the end, we're all still family.

Amy Martin: 00:16:09

And she says here in the village, even when they have

Amy Martin: 00:16:12

conflicts, people are repeatedly drawn back together through the

Amy Martin: 00:16:16

process of providing for themselves as a community. She

Amy Martin: 00:16:19

told me, just shortly before I had arrived, some hunters had

Amy Martin: 00:16:22

caught some whales, and as they've done for thousands of

Amy Martin: 00:16:25

years, that food was distributed throughout the village.

Amy Martin: 00:16:29

Nora Jane Burns: So I was able to get some meat and the blubber

Amy Martin: 00:16:33

to make the oil I was blessed with that. So this community

Amy Martin: 00:16:38

shares. We may look dysfunctional, but we all share,

Amy Martin: 00:16:43

they all take care of it. You know, when they see somebody

Amy Martin: 00:16:46

needing they'll, they'll, they'll step up.

Amy Martin: 00:16:49

Yeah, it doesn't matter. It's not like, oh no,

Amy Martin: 00:16:51

Nora Jane's against oil, so we're not going to give her any

Amy Martin: 00:16:54

whales.

Amy Martin: 00:16:54

Nora Jane Burns: No, no, and it's not like that. No, yeah,

Amy Martin: 00:16:56

yeah. Blood runs deep. So you got family members that you're

Amy Martin: 00:17:00

related to, and we may think differently, but in the end, we

Amy Martin: 00:17:05

always end up when we have to work together. We all work

Amy Martin: 00:17:07

together.

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Listening to Nora Jane, I felt like I was hearing

Amy Martin: 00:17:14

about atauchikun in action, and it actually made me long for

Amy Martin: 00:17:18

some similar kind of thing that we could do as a whole country.

Amy Martin: 00:17:21

Some hands on physical project in the natural world that we do

Amy Martin: 00:17:25

with and for each other, no matter what our political views.

Amy Martin: 00:17:29

It wouldn't make our disagreements go away, but it

Amy Martin: 00:17:32

might help us remember just how interwoven our fates truly are.

Amy Martin: 00:17:37

At least that seems to be how it works for Nora Jane and other

Amy Martin: 00:17:40

people I talked to in Kaktovik.

Amy Martin: 00:17:42

Nora Jane Burns: I try to look at it that way and say, just

Amy Martin: 00:17:44

because I think this way, I'm not going to hate your guts for

Amy Martin: 00:17:47

thinking that way, because I know that they want best for

Amy Martin: 00:17:51

themselves, but I just say, well, we want to make sure we

Amy Martin: 00:17:55

have something for our future generation to be able to use the

Amy Martin: 00:18:00

land and stuff like that.

Amy Martin: 00:18:04

We'll have more after this short break.

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:14

I'm Dallas Taylor, host of 20,000 Hertz, a

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:18

podcast that reveals the untold stories behind the sounds of our

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:21

world. We've uncovered the incredible intelligence of

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:24

talking parrots.

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:25

Basically, bird brain was a pejorative term, and here I had

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:30

this bird that was doing the same types of tasks as the

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:33

primates.

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:34

We've investigated the bonding power of music.

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:37

There's an intimacy there in communicating through the medium

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:41

of music that can be really a powerful force for bringing

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:45

people together.

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We've explored the subtle nuances of the human voice.

Unknown: 00:18:49

We have to remember that humans, over many hundreds

Unknown: 00:18:52

of thousands of years of evolution, have become extremely

Unknown: 00:18:55

attuned to the sounds of each other's voices.

Dallas Taylor: 00:18:58

And we've revealed why a famous composer

Dallas Taylor: 00:19:00

wrote a piece made entirely of silence.

Unknown: 00:19:03

I think that's a really potentially quite useful and

Unknown: 00:19:06

quite profound experience to have.

Dallas Taylor: 00:19:08

Subscribe to 20,000 Hertz right here in your

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podcast player. I'll meet you there.

Amy Martin: 00:19:13

Hey, I want to take a minute to thank you for

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thresholdpodcast.org. Just click the donate button and give what

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So just got woken up by the sound of Robert Thompson

Amy Martin: 00:20:52

knocking on the door saying, there's bears in town. And, how

Amy Martin: 00:20:57

you feeling?

Nick Mott: 00:20:58

Excited! Most excited I've maybe ever been at 6am.

Amy Martin: 00:21:02

Welcome back to Threshold, I'm Amy Martin, and

Amy Martin: 00:21:05

that's producer Nick Mott. This was our very first morning in

Amy Martin: 00:21:08

Kaktovik.

Amy Martin: 00:21:09

We're gonna go drive around Kaktovik and apparently meet

Amy Martin: 00:21:13

some polar bears. Polar bears in town are actually not a good

Amy Martin: 00:21:16

thing, but it's an interesting thing.

Amy Martin: 00:21:19

We throw on our rain shells, hats, gloves and boots- this is

Amy Martin: 00:21:22

August in the Arctic after all- and five minutes later, we meet

Amy Martin: 00:21:25

Robert outside.

Robert Thompson: 00:21:27

I know there's another bear in town. I'm sure I

Robert Thompson: 00:21:29

saw one.

Amy Martin: 00:21:31

Robert Thompson runs a company that takes people on

Amy Martin: 00:21:33

tours to see polar bears in and around Kaktovik. He'd spotted

Amy Martin: 00:21:37

some bears close to his house on the other side of the village,

Amy Martin: 00:21:40

and drove over to get us so we could see them too. He drives us

Amy Martin: 00:21:44

slowly along the gravel roads, scanning for bears, and then

Amy Martin: 00:21:48

parks on the edge of town facing out toward the ocean. He thinks

Amy Martin: 00:21:51

we have a good chance of seeing a bear here.

Robert Thompson: 00:21:53

Oka this, this is what we're doing. It might be

Robert Thompson: 00:21:56

kind of boring, but it pays off.

Amy Martin: 00:21:58

It's not boring to me.

Amy Martin: 00:22:00

There's water everywhere in Kaktovik, not just the ocean

Amy Martin: 00:22:03

ringing this little island, but also puddles and pools seeping

Amy Martin: 00:22:07

up from the ground below and a constant mist falling from the

Amy Martin: 00:22:10

clouds above.

Amy Martin: 00:22:12

Cold, gray, drizzly morning. Oh, oh, there it is.

Robert Thompson: 00:22:18

Yep, there is a bear over there.

Amy Martin: 00:22:23

Straight ahead.

Nick Mott: 00:22:24

Oh, yeah.

Robert Thompson: 00:22:25

I''ll turn it sideways.

Amy Martin: 00:22:26

There's another one.

Amy Martin: 00:22:29

Two bears are ambling along the edge of the island, clearly led

Amy Martin: 00:22:33

by their noses. They lower their heads to sniff the ground and

Amy Martin: 00:22:36

then raise them to sniff the air, in a sort of slow rhythm as

Amy Martin: 00:22:39

they walk. Robert says, as the Arctic warms, more and more

Amy Martin: 00:22:43

bears are coming to the refuge and to Kaktovik.

Robert Thompson: 00:22:47

You know, in a time when all the ice is gone in

Robert Thompson: 00:22:49

Arctic Ocean, all the bears gonna have to come ashore. So

Robert Thompson: 00:22:55

they could become extinct.

Amy Martin: 00:23:02

Polar bears evolved to spend a lot of time living on

Amy Martin: 00:23:05

sea ice. They sleep on it. They hunt seals and other ocean

Amy Martin: 00:23:09

animals from it. They even build their winter dens in it. But

Amy Martin: 00:23:12

lately, sea ice has been receding into the far north in

Amy Martin: 00:23:15

the summers, and it can carry the bears into really deep

Amy Martin: 00:23:18

water, where they have a hard time finding food. Robert thinks

Amy Martin: 00:23:22

some polar bears are learning to get off the ice before it melts,

Amy Martin: 00:23:25

and instead, make a go of it on land, places like the coastal

Amy Martin: 00:23:29

plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and barrier

Amy Martin: 00:23:32

islands like this one. This influx of polar bears has been

Amy Martin: 00:23:35

good for Robert's guiding business, but it's also made him

Amy Martin: 00:23:38

keenly aware of what's at stake here.

Robert Thompson: 00:23:43

I could be here and see the last polar bear in

Robert Thompson: 00:23:46

Alaska. That would be sad to see. Hell, I haven't seen a bear

Robert Thompson: 00:23:49

for a few years, oh, they must be gone. Could be, you know,

Robert Thompson: 00:23:54

people don't realize that this climate change is quite serious.

Robert Thompson: 00:23:58

Is he still walking?

Amy Martin: 00:23:59

Yeah, it's actually, it looks like it's almost the

Amy Martin: 00:24:02

water is like getting deeper and it's it's maybe about to start

Amy Martin: 00:24:07

swimming. I don't know. You can see a little black nose moving

Amy Martin: 00:24:09

back and forth.

Amy Martin: 00:24:11

This is kind of how it went with Robert. We're taking in this

Amy Martin: 00:24:14

really heavy information about the long term prospects for

Amy Martin: 00:24:17

these animals, while simultaneously getting our minds

Amy Martin: 00:24:20

blown watching them go about their polar bear business. It's

Amy Martin: 00:24:23

just a few degrees above freezing, the wind is whipping

Amy Martin: 00:24:26

and tossing up big waves, and the polar bear we're watching

Amy Martin: 00:24:30

just strolls into the water as if it's strolling across a park.

Amy Martin: 00:24:34

It's just kind of bobbing around out there in the ocean. It's

Amy Martin: 00:24:37

crazy.

Amy Martin: 00:24:39

Now, of course, I know that polar bears are marine animals.

Amy Martin: 00:24:42

I know this is a bear that can swim, but still, there's a bear

Amy Martin: 00:24:46

swimming right in front of me in freezing cold water. It feels

Amy Martin: 00:24:51

like a party trick, maybe because all of my other bear

Amy Martin: 00:24:54

encounters have involved large brown animals and forests. I

Amy Martin: 00:24:58

just wasn't prepared for how surprising it would be to see a

Amy Martin: 00:25:02

huge, shaggy creature casually walk into the ocean and swim

Amy Martin: 00:25:06

about with such ease.

Amy Martin: 00:25:09

There's something that's like playful looking about it,

Amy Martin: 00:25:11

because it's, it's getting pushed around by the waves a

Amy Martin: 00:25:15

little bit, and-

Robert Thompson: 00:25:16

He still coming this way?

Amy Martin: 00:25:17

Yeah, I think so, just coming in and out of view.

Amy Martin: 00:25:22

Oh yeah, yeah, shaking its head.

Amy Martin: 00:25:25

Eventually, the bear swims into the shallows, stands up and

Amy Martin: 00:25:28

walks out of the waves and onto the beach in front of us, and we

Amy Martin: 00:25:32

can see the water just pouring off of its ivory fur. The

Amy Martin: 00:25:36

individual hairs in that fur have evolved to repel water, so

Amy Martin: 00:25:39

it only takes a strong, full body shake, and this bear goes

Amy Martin: 00:25:43

from soaking wet to mostly dry in a few seconds. I'm captivated

Amy Martin: 00:25:48

by its paws.

Amy Martin: 00:25:50

Those paws look huge.

Robert Thompson: 00:25:52

They are.

Amy Martin: 00:25:53

How big?

Robert Thompson: 00:25:54

It would probably be, about a foot long.

Amy Martin: 00:25:56

They're almost like flippers in the water.

Robert Thompson: 00:25:59

They swim with their front legs, they just drag

Robert Thompson: 00:26:02

the back feet around.

Amy Martin: 00:26:03

Oh, really, it's running.

Robert Thompson: 00:26:05

They always look so comical when they're

Robert Thompson: 00:26:07

running.

Amy Martin: 00:26:07

I was just gonna say, I've got a really funny

Amy Martin: 00:26:09

run.

Robert Thompson: 00:26:09

They look clumsy, but they can run about

Robert Thompson: 00:26:11

30 miles an hour for a short distance. I saw one grab a

Robert Thompson: 00:26:15

seagull out of the air once.

Amy Martin: 00:26:17

Wow.

Robert Thompson: 00:26:18

Decided to catch it. It ran after it. The

Robert Thompson: 00:26:20

seagull took off and he grabbed it. I don't think a person could

Robert Thompson: 00:26:24

do that.

Amy Martin: 00:26:25

I know I couldn't.

Amy Martin: 00:26:27

One of the surreal things about this scene is that when I glance

Amy Martin: 00:26:30

behind me, I can see the village of Kaktovik right there, like I

Amy Martin: 00:26:35

could walk to the school in less than 15 minutes. And this

Amy Martin: 00:26:38

proximity to bears poses real challenges for people here and

Amy Martin: 00:26:42

other Arctic villages seeing an increase of bear activity due to

Amy Martin: 00:26:45

climate change. These are huge, potentially dangerous wild

Amy Martin: 00:26:48

animals. Having a lot of them around means you have to be

Amy Martin: 00:26:52

vigilant. You have to think twice before sending your kids

Amy Martin: 00:26:55

outside to play. You need to carry a gun when you go to the

Amy Martin: 00:26:58

dump out on the edge of town. Kaktovik has actually set up a

Amy Martin: 00:27:01

community polar bear patrolling system to alert residents when

Amy Martin: 00:27:04

bears get close, and to try to haze them away from the village.

Amy Martin: 00:27:08

Robert says all of this is a big change from how it used to be.

Amy Martin: 00:27:12

He grew up in interior Alaska, but he moved to Kaktovik more

Amy Martin: 00:27:15

than 30 years ago.

Robert Thompson: 00:27:16

But bears weren't really a problem until

Robert Thompson: 00:27:18

recently with climate change and Arctic Ocean is opening up. When

Robert Thompson: 00:27:23

I first came, you could see the pack ice from the shore all

Robert Thompson: 00:27:26

summer.

Amy Martin: 00:27:27

How far away would that be?

Robert Thompson: 00:27:29

Oh, within sight, like four or five miles.

Robert Thompson: 00:27:31

There was ice there all the time. We'd go out there with a

Robert Thompson: 00:27:33

boat and sit on the ice and hunt seals or whales. But now, last

Robert Thompson: 00:27:38

time I went whaling, we didn't see any ice. We won't see any

Robert Thompson: 00:27:42

now. It's all gone. There's probably 200 miles of open water

Robert Thompson: 00:27:48

right now, and every year it's more.

Amy Martin: 00:27:51

And this is one of the main reasons why Robert is

Amy Martin: 00:27:54

strongly opposed to oil development in the refuge. He

Amy Martin: 00:27:57

sees a direct relationship between drilling for oil and

Amy Martin: 00:28:01

losing polar bears. The global population of polar bears is

Amy Martin: 00:28:06

estimated to be around 25,000 animals, but there's a lot of

Amy Martin: 00:28:10

uncertainty around that number, because it's difficult to get an

Amy Martin: 00:28:13

accurate count of an animal that lives in a hard to access place

Amy Martin: 00:28:17

with a habitat that spans five national boundaries. Scientists

Amy Martin: 00:28:22

have divided the global population into 19

Amy Martin: 00:28:25

subpopulations, and in some of those groups, polar bear numbers

Amy Martin: 00:28:28

are holding steady or even going up. Some of them are a big

Amy Martin: 00:28:32

question mark, not enough data to say what's really going on.

Amy Martin: 00:28:36

And some aren't doing so well. The bears we're watching are

Amy Martin: 00:28:39

part of the Southern Beaufort Sea group, and a recent study

Amy Martin: 00:28:42

listed this sub population as one of the three most vulnerable

Amy Martin: 00:28:46

in the world. Robert says loss of sea ice isn't just a threat

Amy Martin: 00:28:50

to these bears, either. It's also a major threat to Inupiaq

Amy Martin: 00:28:54

culture.

Robert Thompson: 00:28:56

I was here before environmental was even

Robert Thompson: 00:28:59

discussed or talked about or a concern. We lived here like this

Robert Thompson: 00:29:02

is going to go on forever. We didn't even think that it could

Robert Thompson: 00:29:05

change.

Amy Martin: 00:29:06

Yeah.

Robert Thompson: 00:29:07

You know, when we go out hunting, this is what

Robert Thompson: 00:29:09

we did, what we're going to do, and now that's in jeopardy.

Amy Martin: 00:29:13

Robert says drilling for oil and the refuge is like

Amy Martin: 00:29:15

taking a one two punch at Inupiaq culture. It contributes

Amy Martin: 00:29:19

to the global warming that's disrupting their ways of life

Amy Martin: 00:29:23

and it undermines their values by putting an emphasis on making

Amy Martin: 00:29:26

money off of the land versus subsisting off of it in

Amy Martin: 00:29:29

traditional ways. He says he asks his neighbors who support

Amy Martin: 00:29:33

oil development-

Robert Thompson: 00:29:34

What do you want to do, make a lot of money

Robert Thompson: 00:29:36

or preserve the culture? They know that it's not right to be

Robert Thompson: 00:29:40

that way.

Amy Martin: 00:29:41

What would you say to people who are like, You know

Amy Martin: 00:29:44

what though, people in Kaktovik, they live here, they need the

Amy Martin: 00:29:48

money to help their community. You know, there's the argument

Amy Martin: 00:29:51

like, well, we need the money.

Robert Thompson: 00:29:53

Well, they can go get a job and work for it. I

Robert Thompson: 00:29:56

don't have much sympathy with that, because I'm not worried

Robert Thompson: 00:29:58

about money. And it, they don't need this money to get ahead in

Robert Thompson: 00:30:03

this community, because they still got, what, 95% of the

Robert Thompson: 00:30:07

North Slope that can be exploited. They don't need to do

Robert Thompson: 00:30:10

the refuge to get the money.

Amy Martin: 00:30:12

That percentage is pretty accurate. The coastal

Amy Martin: 00:30:15

plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is one of the

Amy Martin: 00:30:18

only places on the North Slope where oil development was

Amy Martin: 00:30:21

expressly prohibited. The vast majority of the region is

Amy Martin: 00:30:24

legally open for drilling. And Robert thinks more than enough

Amy Martin: 00:30:28

money can be made on land outside of the refuge to help

Amy Martin: 00:30:31

people in Kaktovik and other small villages on the slope get

Amy Martin: 00:30:34

ahead.

Robert Thompson: 00:30:35

So, the argument we have to do the

Robert Thompson: 00:30:37

refuge so we get money, it has no merit.

Amy Martin: 00:30:40

Robert also thinks the economics of drilling in the

Amy Martin: 00:30:43

refuge just don't really pencil out. The United States already

Amy Martin: 00:30:46

has so much oil waiting to be produced that's far easier and

Amy Martin: 00:30:50

less expensive for companies to bring to market, like the huge

Amy Martin: 00:30:53

amount of shale oil that's been discovered in Texas in recent

Amy Martin: 00:30:56

years. He doubts that the people of Kaktovik will really benefit

Amy Martin: 00:31:00

that much from drilling. He thinks they're being sold an

Amy Martin: 00:31:03

empty dream.

Robert Thompson: 00:31:04

But that's what people want to hear. So people

Robert Thompson: 00:31:06

ask to want to hear, we'll get big dividends, we'll have all

Robert Thompson: 00:31:09

this money, we'll be happy, but I don't see it happening.

Amy Martin: 00:31:15

Robert has attended international climate change

Amy Martin: 00:31:17

conferences. He's spoken out against oil development at

Amy Martin: 00:31:21

shareholder meetings, and he takes hundreds of tourists on

Amy Martin: 00:31:24

trips to see polar bears, tourists who go home with a new

Amy Martin: 00:31:28

found appreciation for the specialness of this place. All

Amy Martin: 00:31:31

of this has put him right in the crosshairs of the pro oil crowd.

Robert Thompson: 00:31:36

And I've had, I've seen in writing criticism.

Robert Thompson: 00:31:40

Oh he speaks, oh, he does trips, and he's making money off it.

Robert Thompson: 00:31:43

Well, yes, I am. I'm showing people the refuge, and then they

Robert Thompson: 00:31:46

go and talk about it. So there's some resentment that there's

Robert Thompson: 00:31:49

people here showing the public about it. So I'm not going to

Robert Thompson: 00:31:53

worry about it. It can't trip me up. I fought for the right of

Robert Thompson: 00:31:57

freedom of speech, democracy, and I can say anything I want.

Amy Martin: 00:32:02

And when Robert says he fought for that right, he

Amy Martin: 00:32:05

means it very literally. He's a veteran of the Vietnam War.

Robert Thompson: 00:32:09

My 20th birthday was my first day of

Robert Thompson: 00:32:11

duty in Vietnam, and they put me on duty and I said it's my 20th

Robert Thompson: 00:32:17

birthday, first day of duty in Vietnam. And then I came up here

Robert Thompson: 00:32:26

and started living here and hunting, and I said, they're

Robert Thompson: 00:32:28

gonna put an oil field where I go hunting, and I don't want to

Robert Thompson: 00:32:31

live in an oil field, so I do what I can to stop that.

Amy Martin: 00:32:36

Do you think your experience in Vietnam shapes how

Amy Martin: 00:32:40

you look at some of these environmental issues at all?

Robert Thompson: 00:32:42

To some degree, because, you know, the peace and

Robert Thompson: 00:32:46

tranquility you get from being on the land is something that we

Robert Thompson: 00:32:51

should all look at, you know, especially after, you know,

Robert Thompson: 00:32:55

being in a war and so on.

Amy Martin: 00:32:57

You really, you could feel how you needed that.

Robert Thompson: 00:32:59

Oh yea, a lot of people do.

Amy Martin: 00:33:09

When you're trying to maintain a sense of

Amy Martin: 00:33:11

togetherness, even during times of conflict, One of the biggest

Amy Martin: 00:33:14

questions you have to answer is who is invited to the

Amy Martin: 00:33:18

conversation? This comes up again and again in the national

Amy Martin: 00:33:21

debate over the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. If you've never

Amy Martin: 00:33:25

been to the refuge, if you don't live in Alaska, should you have

Amy Martin: 00:33:28

a say in determining the fate of this place? Robert Thompson says

Amy Martin: 00:33:33

yes. He says you don't have to live in Kaktovik to find meaning

Amy Martin: 00:33:37

and comfort in knowing the refuge is there without the

Amy Martin: 00:33:40

roads and lights and noise that fill up so much of the rest of

Amy Martin: 00:33:43

this planet.

Robert Thompson: 00:33:44

Most people won't be out on that refuge. 325

Robert Thompson: 00:33:49

million people in United States. What percentage will ever get

Robert Thompson: 00:33:53

here? But to know that there's places still, I guess, you say,

Robert Thompson: 00:33:58

for future generations that are pristine and nice to go to. So

Robert Thompson: 00:34:03

those are things that people can look at.

Amy Martin: 00:34:11

But many people on the pro-oil side feel

Amy Martin: 00:34:14

differently. Including one of Alaska's most powerful

Amy Martin: 00:34:18

politicians.

Don Young: 00:34:19

Listen to the people live there. That's all I ask you

Don Young: 00:34:22

to do. Listen to them. Hear what they say. Not someone is living

Don Young: 00:34:25

in Fairbanks, not those that are foreigners or living away from

Don Young: 00:34:29

the area.

Amy Martin: 00:34:30

This is Alaska congressman, Don Young. We'll

Amy Martin: 00:34:33

pick up the story there in part two.