The Sun Star: Arctic Shipping
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Transcript of The Sun Star: Arctic Shipping
www.uafsunstar.com 9October 12, 2010West Ridge ReportWest Ridge Report12 The Sun StarOctober 5, 2010
Jeremia Schrock & Amber SandlinSun Star Reporters
The Arctic Ocean: 1000 possibilities and perils
The melting sea ice By the year 2038, the fabled Northwest
Passage through the Arctic Ocean may fi-
nally be open.
For the past 30 years, the Arctic has been
losing it’s summer sea ice. If the climate
doesn’t change, Arctic sea ice will continue
to vanish until there is nothing left to melt,
according to the National Oceanic and At-
mospheric Administration’s (NOAA) web-
site. NOAA projections have shown that by
2038, the Arctic may be almost entirely ice-
free during the summer months.
For polar bears and other forms of Alaska
wildlife that rely on that sea ice, this is a
problem. For Alaska’s human population,
it is an opportunity. That opportunity is the
possibility of opening the North Slope to
trans-Arctic shipping.
“Right now, few people think that Arctic
shipping is going to be an issue,” said Hajo
Eicken, a professor of sea ice geophysics at
UAF, citing several potential problems to be
faced by a hypothetical trans-Arctic ship-
ping company. These problems include
less weather predictability, higher fuel cost,
and the necessity for ships to be built with
thicker hulls capable of withstanding an im-
pact with an iceberg.
An Arctic Ocean free of summer sea
ice is no guarantee for an Arctic free of ice-
bergs, said Eicken. A problem that summer-
time Alaskan waters would face is icebergs
formed from the calving events of the in-
creasingly unstable ice shelves found in the
Canadian Arctic. Some of these bergs would
subsequently become caught in the Beau-
fort Gyre to then be flung past Alaska’s North
Slope. The Beaufort Gyre is a wind-driven
ice circulation pattern near the North Pole.
The impact on Arctic shipping “If [Arctic marine shipping] is done care-
fully and responsibly, it [will] have very lit-
tle impact on the environment,” said Todd
O’Hara, a UAF scientist who specializes
in the wildlife toxicology of Arctic marine
mammals. While O’Hara is willing to ad-
mit he supports the opening of the Arctic to
shipping, he feels that ascertaining the en-
vironmental costs of such an endeavor are
crucial in determining its worth.
O’Hara cited the Deepwater Horizon oil
spill in the Gulf of Mexico as proof that, in
the event of a disaster, coordinating an ap-
propriate response is critical. He added that
Dangerous fun One event cited by the USCG occurred
off the coast of Antarctica in November
2007. A cruise liner, the MS Explorer, struck
an iceberg while sailing through the Brans-
field Strait near King George Island. While
the passengers and crew were rescued after
only five hours adrift, their rescue was made
possible because of their proximity to sev-
eral other merchant vessels, as well as the
Argentinean and Chilean coast guard
Princess Cruises, one of Alaska’s biggest
cruise lines, said that they currently have
no intention of expanding their maritime
tourism business to the Arctic Ocean in the
event that it becomes ice free.
A distant protector
The biggest prohibition in Arctic marine
safety is the lack of infrastructure. In the
eventuality that “full seasonal operations
in the Arctic” become necessary, the USCG
will be the primary provider of maritime
safety and security in the region. In fact, an
internal presentation within the USCG said,
“the Arctic is upon us.”
According to an interview in the North
Slope newspaper, The Arctic Sounder, Capt.
William Deal, the commanding officer of
the USCG air station at Kodiak, said any res-
cue attempt as far north as the Arctic “would
likely require use of a Coast Guard icebreak-
er or air-refuelable helicopters from the U.S.
Air Force.” Deal was referencing an event
that occurred in June where the USCG sent
a C-130 out of Kodiak to assess whether or
not a team of Russian researchers near the
North Pole was under distress. They were
not.
Currently, there is no USCG station or for-
ward operating base located anywhere on
the North Slope. However, the building of
a USCG station at Point Barrow is currently
in the works, according to Jeremy Zidek, a
spokesperson for the State of Alaska’s Divi-
sion of Homeland Security and Emergency
Management (DHS&EM).
“It is certainly a concern that more
shipping is going on there,” Zidek added.
A changing ecosystem For UAF wildlife biologist Skip Walker,
if the Arctic were open today there would
be an immediate “increased human pres-
ence in the Arctic.” Walker, who focuses
on the disturbance and recovery of Arctic
ecosystems, foresees an ice-free Arctic as
providing Alaska with increased access to
its natural resources, making their develop-
ment more economically feasible. In all like-
lihood, these developments would act as a
stimulant to Alaska’s economy.
“As far as ecosystems go, this is a huge
question that goes beyond the consequenc-
es of the Arctic becoming a major shipping
route,” he continued. “Obviously, melting
sea ice would allow shipping lanes to open
up. But the melting sea-ice also has big im-
pacts on the adjacent land areas.”
Walker believes that over the next cen-
tury, Alaska will see gradual changes to its
Arctic ecosystems, adding that the loss of
coastal summer sea-ice along mainland
areas that are currently tundra “would very
likely cause these areas to change to boreal
forest,” much as they would have been dur-
ing the Late Cretaceous period 65 million
years ago.
*The year in which the Arctic Ocean will be
almost entirely ice-free for the summer.
2038*
142**The number of years
the United States Coast has been
patrolling the Arctic
$1.6B**The amount of money Sen.
Mark Begich wants to ap-propriate to build two new polar-capable icebreakers.
The Arctic is upon us. - United States Coast Guard
in the event of an Arctic disaster, Canada
and the U.S. would probably work close to-
gether. Eicken felt the same.
One organization that is concerned with
the annual loss of sea ice is the United States
Arctic Research Commission (USARC).
USARC held its 94th meeting this past week
at UAF to discuss issues facing the Arctic re-
gion. However, concern by the commission
over thinning Arctic ice and its potential
ramifications for the region date back to as
early as 2002.
According to one USARC article, the “Ca-
nadian Archipelago will be ice-free and
open to navigation by non ice-strengthened
ships in summer.”
The unpredictability of polar environments
has led organizations like the United States
Coast Guard (USCG) and the University of
the Arctic Institute for Applied Circumpolar
Policy (IACP) to begin discussing the prob-
lems of maintaining maritime law enforce-
ment and marine safety in such regions.
If [Arctic marine shipping] is done carefully and re-sponsibly it [will] have very little impact
on the environment.
-Todd O’Hara, UAF Wildlife Biologist
ICETECH 2010: A conference held this Sep-
tember by the Arctic Section of the Society
of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers
(SNAME) whose theme was “Performance
of Ships and Structures in Ice.”
Shell Offshore, Inc: Filed an application
with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Manage-
ment on Oct. 6 to drill an exploration well in
the Beaufort Sea next summer.
Princess Cruises: Has no intent of expand-
ing their tourist operations to the Arctic
Ocean.
Hajo Eicken: A professor of sea ice geophys-
ics at UAF who believes that attempting to
ship goods across the Arctic Ocean is not
cost-effective at the present time.
United States Arctic Research Commis-sion (USARC): Has stated that the Cana-
dian Arctic is already open to navigation by
non-ice strengthened ships. Held a confer-
ence at UAF this month (October) to discuss
Arctic issues.
United States Coast Guard (USCG): Is pre-
paring to take on a greater role patrolling
the Arctic Ocean. Intends to build a station
at Point Barrow.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad-ministration (NOAA): Believes that the
Arctic will be ice-free within the next 30
years. Fears that a loss of sea ice will result in
severe storms on the Eastern United States.
Marinette Marine Corporation: The recipi-
ents of a $123 million contract to build a
254-foot Alaska Region Research Vessel for
UAF.
Todd O’Hara: A UAF wildlife biologist who
supports shipping through the Arctic if it
can be done safely and responsibility.
S.1561: A senate bill sponsored by Sen. Mark
Begich which calls for an appropriation of
funds in order to build a “fully functional
harbor of refuge throughout the year” at St.
George Island, and three forward operating
bases at Barrow, Nome and St. Paul Island.
Where do things stand now?
“”
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