Tour of the Arctic 2 2 from Greenland to Alaska DW Documentary

This is a world of incredible natural beauty, raw and hostile, one that knows no mercy, and where mistakes can have fatal consequences. Life here has always been a fight for survival. In a world where in summer the sun never sets, and in winter the nights are full of magic and color, we are exploring the most remote locations in this inhospitable terrain, from Greenland through the Northwest Passage to Alaska. We meet people who sense that their world is changing, and those who are changing it. This is a world in which the future of humanity will be decided. The Arctic. While taking risky maneuvers at full speed, Olga Barseleisen feverishly looks for a passage through the ice. It's a race against time. A northeasterly wind that's unusually powerful for early July drives large amounts of drift ice from the Arctic Ocean into the fjord. The freezing headwind makes travel difficult and pushes the ice sheets closer and closer together, creating pack ice. After traveling almost 700 kilometers in the Scoresby Sound, we find ourselves stranded in the Arctic together with the Barseleisen family in one of the most isolated and inhospitable places on Earth. A week before, we departed Iceland on a two-hour flight over the Arctic Ocean. Our destination, Ittoqqortoormiit, a village some 800 kilometers away from its closest neighbors. The descent itself is breathtaking. On the shoreline of one of the fjord's branches, we land on a gravel runway. It was built by an American oil firm which withdrew from the development in 1990, but the runway remains. We have to continue our journey by boat, as there are no roads. The trip takes close to two hours. On a peaceful and beautiful July afternoon like this, who'd imagine that anything could go wrong? The colorful houses of Ittoqqortoormiit stand out like beacons between the rocks and the ice. We're overwhelmed by the incredible beauty of the Arctic, and its vastness confounds our senses. The icebergs often as tall as skyscrapers. It's more than 40 kilometers from here to the shoreline on the other side of the fjord. 350 people live in Ittoqqortoormiit. Almost all are Inuit. Most of the work they do is directly or indirectly subsidized by the Danish government, which keeps the settlement alive. There's a church, hospital, sports center, and a primary school here, along with what might be the world's most spectacular soccer pitch. Its artificial turf is carefully manicured between the rubble and the snow. They've even just opened an outdoor pool for children. It's only the second one in all of Greenland. The kids splash around to the sound of techno music. Even though the water's a little chilly, that still needs some improvement. How warm is the water? Around 10 degrees. 10 degrees? Yeah, 10 degrees. Isn't it too cold for the kids? That's cold, but we're working on warmer. At the small weather station, they're releasing a weather balloon, like they do every day at 11 each morning and night, at the same time as hundreds of weather stations around the world. Tore Andreasen runs the station. He's lived in Ittoqqortoormiit for 46 years, but says things have changed dramatically here in recent years. The weather systems have changed. The temperature, the humidity, the precipitation has changed. Everything has changed. It's been a lot warmer and a lot more humid, a lot more rain in summertime. The climate we have now was what they had a thousand kilometers south of us when I came. It's quite a big change. Above the village, there's a cemetery with a stunning view. Even if it's getting warmer here, in the summer, they still dig extra graves to be able to bury those who die in winter when the ground is frozen solid. Suddenly, there's excitement in the village. The men are loading their guns and everyone's on their feet. People drop everything to go and watch. The narwhals are here. Those who aren't in the boats watch from the shoreline. And tell the hunters which way to go. Time and again, the whales submerge and the boats chase after them. The sound of large-caliber weapons resonates throughout the bay. The hunters fear the smell of the corpses could attract polar bears. To keep them away from the shoreline and the settlement, the dead whales are hauled onto an ice sheet and carved up there. Outside one of the cabins, we meet Mette Barseliasi, who's following the action with binoculars. Her husband, Orga, and her brother, Agalu, are taking part in the hunt. We ask her why people here are so crazy about narwhals. What role does narwhal hunting play for your community? It's very important to our own supply for the whole year. You eat the meat, you make oil from the skin fat, and the skin you eat it. And if you're good to do handicraft, you can make jewelry from, you know, the tooth. Mette invites us to stay for lunch. Goulash is on the menu. It's the children's favorite. Mette tells us that much has changed here in recent years. And asks if we'd like to join them on a boat trip up the fjord in the coming days. We travel almost 400 kilometers with them up the Scoresby Sound, at 50 or 60 kilometers an hour, navigating our way through the ice. After four hours of a very cold and for us often nerve-wracking journey, we take a break in stunning surroundings. The silence is only broken by the sound of melting glaciers. While her youngest son Brian keeps an eye out for polar bears, which can appear out of nowhere at any time, we ask Mette about the biggest changes she's observed here in recent years. The glaciers the last years have been smelting roughly like 10 years ago, and to now it can smell up to one kilometer. Then suddenly two polar bears appear, a mother and her cub. A potentially extremely dangerous encounter for both parties. So it's lucky for us we're sitting safely in our boat. And lucky for the polar bears, this year's bag quota has already been reached. I don't want to go nearby because they have very huge claws. But I like the meat. As a goulash, you know, you make small pieces of the meat, then make a goulash out of it with rice. It's very good. Polar bear goulash. Our journey up the fjord continues. We've been traveling through this magical world of ice for two days. But this isn't a family holiday, even if it sometimes looks like it. Eight-year-old Brian drives us to our camp for the night at full speed. Isn't Meta worried? He was afraid when he was five and six because he's still so little. But his father wants him to learn how to drive as early as possible. And did he already shoot? He knew how to shoot when he was four or five. As often as they can, they bring their children to the fjord to teach them how to survive here in the Arctic, how to feed themselves, how to hunt and fish, how to creep up on polar bears, seals and muskox, and how to adapt to the ever-changing world around them. It has been a river here, but it's all dry now. Before, we could get the water here, next to the camp. So now we don't have more snow and glacier up here in the mountains, and now it's all dry. It's because it's warmer, and we have a longer summer period, and the winter season, it's warmer earlier, so the snow, it always melts. The next morning, we need to move fast. A strong wind is coming up, and that could prove dangerous. So we need to leave. We still have a 350-kilometer return trip ahead of us. And then we find ourselves stranded in the Arctic. Mette's brother Agalu has gone on ahead, crossing the ice floes on foot, looking for a passage through the ice. How is it? Good? Not good. Our biggest worry now is that something could happen to the boats. They risk being destroyed by drift ice. And without the boats, there's no way to get back. We have to turn around. In an ice-free bay, we meet some hunters who are also stuck. We launch our drone to get a better overview of the situation. Agalu and the other hunters examine our images. It really doesn't look good. There's thick pack ice all the way to the horizon. We're not going to get out of here so quickly. We set up camp and post guards to watch out for polar bears. The hunters share their food with us. Mette cuts the narwhal skin and blubber into small strips to make them easier to chew. The narwhal is good too. Yes, it's fresh. It's caught yesterday. The place we should have come. Tastes like chewing gum. Yeah, it's very good. So good to keep us warm now. After being stuck here for two days, things suddenly move very quickly. The family has made a decision. Orga tells us Agalu will bring us back. The three of us, the children and one hunter in one boat. Mette and Orga want the children to get back to the village. It's growing too cold out here and the polar bears pose an ever-present danger. They plan to follow us as soon as there's a clear path through the ice. Their boat is too big to haul over the ice. It's a tiring and perilous journey back. Anyone who falls into the water here is unlikely to survive. It's hard for us to judge exactly how thick the ice really is. We drag our boat over the pack ice. All the time we're afraid that the ice could crack or that someone could slip into the icy water. We make our way from ice flow to ice flow, taking advantage of every little ice-free passage to use the boat. We drag, push and pull, getting in and out of the boat for hours on end. This isn't normal for the middle of July. The new weather patterns are making life difficult for the Inuit. The knowledge they've acquired over many generations, which helps them predict weather conditions, is becoming unreliable. Late that evening, after hours crossing the ice, we're finally in the clear. A helicopter arrives to pick us up. Eric, the local policeman, has come to say goodbye and make sure we're okay. The narwhals are back in the bay, and after two nights on the ice, Meta has also made it home. We leave Ittoquatorimit deeply moved by its people and its natural beauty. The path to the landing strip is still blocked by ice. This is Yellowknife, Canada, at the military section of its airport. We're traveling with the 2nd Battalion of Quebec's Royal 22nd Regiment, a unit which supports Canada's Joint Task Force North. It's been a long trip from Ittoquatorimit. Almost 8,000 kilometers, with stops in Quebec and Yellowknife, before we reach Cambridge Bay in the Canadian Arctic. We're taking part in Operation Nanook Nanakput, its mission to patrol the Northwest Passage — Canadian territory that could hardly be more isolated. The two Griffin military helicopters fly low, taking advantage of the element of surprise. The helicopters head out over the water. They have their sights set on a cargo ship, and radio the freighter to identify itself. The captain is surprised. He asks why the helicopter is there. He never imagined that two military helicopters would suddenly appear in the middle of the night. This amuses the pilots. The freighter was properly registered, but the message is clear. Anyone traveling through the Northwest Passage should expect to face questions. Back at Command Central, debriefings are taking place. Reconnaissance patrols are to be transferred to observation posts in the Northwest Passage. To monitor an area approximately the size of Germany. In order to maintain our sovereignty, like, during this time of the year, there's no ice, so there's a lot more boat traffic. So we want to make sure we can have people on the ground and in the air with the Air Force support to monitor any type of maritime activity. It's also for the ship that didn't say they would come. Russian submarine. Yeah, yeah, there's a difference between seeing a submarine or a fishing boat, right? So one of the two require a different... They require a different response. The base of their operations is known as Cam Main. Located at Cambridge Bay, it's part of the joint Canadian-American North Warning System. Roughly 2,000 people live in Cambridge Bay. It's a kind of rough-and-tumble Arctic frontier town in the middle of nowhere that's kept alive with generous support from the Canadian government. Most of the people here live from hunting and fishing and government subsidies. Fishing for Arctic char is one of the few good-paying jobs here. People can earn around 4,000 euros for two weeks' work. But the fishing grounds are spread all over the Northwest Passage and are often only reachable by float plane. At the dock in Cambridge Bay, we meet some fishermen unloading their catch. We ask if they've encountered vessels in the Northwest Passage that have no business being there. I heard stories of elders out on boats and they see something out in the distance thinking it's an island and all of a sudden it just submerges, disappears. Yes, yes. Out in the copper mine area. Really? Yes, yes. We know based on some sight from other people that they said that those Russians, they do come in the Canadian Arctic. But that's all we know and it's been in the news. So basically, you know, I know the government of Canada, they're trying to keep it low somehow, not make a big deal out of it. But I'm sure that they know a lot more than what they say. At an observation post, we meet the commander of Joint Task Force North, Brigadier General Patrick Carpentier. He's inspecting his troops, who are conducting surveillance in this isolated region. He explains how hard it is to maintain a presence throughout Canada's north. If you take that area of land, it's about the size of the continental U.S. So in that area, there's only 115,000 people that are separated in about 72 different communities. So the challenges are communication, transportation, infrastructure. Everything is a challenge in the north, and that's not counting climate. His troops are always accompanied by a group of Arctic rangers, local Inuit who work with the military. They play an important role. They're critical because if you think of the Arctic, it's so big. The rangers are really the eyes and ears and the voice of the north. They give us a lot of situational awareness about what's going on in the Arctic. The Canadian Armed Forces only have around 400 soldiers permanently stationed here in the north. So they couldn't do without the help of the Arctic rangers and the local population. Along with two Arctic rangers and a reconnaissance patrol, we're being transferred to an outpost on a small, uninhabited island. The pilots ask us if we get airsick. We're told to be honest, because lots of people start to feel queasy when the helicopter picks up speed. They fly low and fast. For more than an hour, we travel over rocky terrain, as well as countless lakes. Sometimes it feels like we could reach out and touch the ground. We have to disembark quickly. The pilots need to return to base. This is to be our camp for the next few days. A couple of tents on a small island in the middle of the Arctic. There are no trees or bushes for protection. We're fully exposed to the wind and weather, which often changes from one minute to the next. Night has fallen. On slightly higher ground, the first guards have taken up position. Using infrared devices and powerful binoculars, they search for hotspots on the icy waters. These can even be detected from great distances away. Will you see a submarine coming if it's up? If it's up, we're going to see it. If it's down, no, we don't. But I know that we have some specialists for submarines with us. Not here, but at the other place. But they don't show us that. The next morning, this reconnaissance patrol is searching the horizon. They've just spotted a foreign invader. It's right there. And when we saw it, it just came back. It's hard to see, but it's right there. I can show you the picture. Watching you guys. Amy and Alan load their guns. The Canadian Arctic is Inuit territory. The soldiers are guests here and unarmed. They don't want to be viewed as an occupying force, so they leave it up to the rangers to defend them. So what will you do then if he comes? Too close, maybe let it down. But for now, the bear is nowhere in sight. Suddenly, a dense fog moves in from the sea. Now it's wet and cold, around three degrees Celsius. Alan says it could take a week for the fog to lift. It looks like we're once again trapped in the Arctic, this time on a small island with a grizzly bear. When it's foggy, let's say we're completely fogged, most of the time they cannot really take off because they can barely see themselves. So if they cannot take off, they cannot land, right? So they won't take that risk. A few days later, the skies have cleared and the helicopters can fly. The brigadier general comes for an inspection. He and his staff have one burning question. Were bears sighted? No, we haven't seen one since day two. But of course, it's not bears that pose the biggest challenge here. They're merely a tactical problem. The strategic challenge is that the North is extremely rich in resources and the immensity is incredible. So to have a presence over such a large territory is an extreme challenge. The Arctic boasts a wealth of natural resources — diamonds, copper, iron, oil, gas, and fish. And now the ice is melting faster and the ground is thawing. It's getting easier to extract these treasures. They're in great demand and only those who maintain a presence here can protect their interests. It's a huge undertaking in Canada, the second largest country on Earth, and a Herculean task up here in the far north, at the end of the world. We continue our journey traveling almost 2,000 kilometers westward to Fairbanks, Alaska. And from there, another 800 kilometers to Deadhorse, by the Beaufort Sea. It's now early October and we're on the Dalton Highway. Much of it is just a mix of mud and gravel. It's been called one of the world's most dangerous roads. Crossing the Yukon River, we head northwards in the Arctic. Following the route of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. And crossing the mighty Brooks Range, a 1,000-kilometer-long mountain range that runs right across northern Alaska. Halfway along the route, we hit Coldfoot, little more than a gas station in the middle of the wilderness. Until the mid-1990s, the Dalton Highway was closed to normal traffic. Anyone wanting to use it needed a special permit from the oil companies. Now truck drivers tell us they're encountering more and more tourists. Most come here in winter to see the northern lights, but they often underestimate the risks. As beautiful as it is, as nice as it is, it's not, to me, it's not worth it because it's, it is very dangerous, you know. And especially come unprepared. Just think about, you might have to walk, you know, 10 miles in this weather. I've helped people up here that come up here and just, they have nothing. No, you know, they have light jackets, they have, you know, tennis shoes and, and it's just not very smart. It's tourists. Yeah, pretty much. We drive further into the mountains. There's been a lot of snowfall in the last few days — unusual for early October. We stop off in Wiseman, a village that boomed during the gold rush. Everywhere, you can see relics from the days when the Dalton Highway and the Trans-Alaska Pipeline were being built in the Arctic. Just 14 people still live in Wiseman, where the freezers look like this, and it's only October. Here, everything is pretty rustic. In his cabin, Jack Rykov is telling a group of Chinese tourists about life in the wilderness and how he shoots moose and bears in order to survive. It's a heavy caliber, 8.6 millimeter. This is what the bullet looks like when it goes. The bullet hits the animal, opens up and shot right through here. Right through the lung. When the bullet goes through the lung, the heart continues to pump blood to the lung, and all the blood keeps gushing out of the lung, and pretty soon the animal runs out of blood and is dead. But Jack tells us the hunting's not as good as it used to be. So anyways, I hunted 15 days. I traveled lots. I climbed a lot of mountains. I thought I looked at a lot of country with hardly anything in it. It makes it harder. Makes it harder. Jack came to Weissman in 1971 with his parents. His father helped to build the Dalton Highway. Jack explains why there are practically no more moose up here in the woods. Now I have three deep snow years since 2004. 1.4 meters of snow annihilates the moose, especially when it melted on top and then froze. They're breaking through to the snow to their chest. They're cutting themselves up on the edge of the snow. The snow was like, was thick crust like that. It was killing them. And it looks like this might be another bad year. There's already too much snow for early October. The air is too warm and too humid. The moose population doesn't have enough time to recover if deep snows occur every four or five years, as they have in the last two decades. Jack shows the Chinese tourists some mighty moose antlers, a popular photomotif. We asked these visitors what brought them here to the far north. As they attempt to drive away, we hope they'll get to see the northern lights tonight. The conditions are favorable. The night sky is clear and full of stars. Suddenly, the heavenly light show commences, gradually becoming more and more spectacular. The next morning, we continue our northward journey towards the Arctic Ocean, following the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. The road is icy. For hours, we fight our way across the Brooks Range, which separates central Alaska from the North Slope region. At the northern foot of the Brooks Range lies the Tulek Field Station. Scientists from around the world come here to research the changes in the Arctic. Jeb Tim manages the station. He says they now have mosquitoes and snakes that can survive the winter here. That's something new. There's no denying climate change is real. It's hard to argue with. And I'm kind of in a weird spot because I'm surrounded by science. I grew up around science, but I'm also a little bit of a redneck. I like to hunt. I like to play on snow machines. But it's hard to argue with, you know, with the research that I see and the glaciers that I see disappearing firsthand. And, you know, just how much warmer our seasons are is pretty obvious. Jeb says it's one thing that it's getting warmer, but what will happen as a result of this will be the really big problem. There's enough permafrost up here that if that thick surface layer, that layer, that 20, 30 meter layer melts, the whole North Slope is going to drop about 30 feet or 10 meters. He says it hasn't gotten to that yet, but things are getting critical. He also stresses that he's no expert. He suggests we talk to Vladimir Romanovsky, one of the world's foremost permafrost researchers. Romanovsky, who advises governments and companies, says the situation's quite clear. We already have 35 years of measurements. And during this period of time, we started with permafrost temperature about minus eight. Now it's minus four on the North Slope of Alaska. Out from 2013, 2014, we have new, really strong wave of warming where all sites in interior Alaska show very substantial warming. Should this continue, it could also have serious consequences for energy supplies around the globe, as more and more of the world's oil and gas supplies come from the Arctic. In many permafrost areas, distribution of ice is very uneven. There are some big chunks of pure, almost pure ice there. And when these chunks are melting, then surface subsides, developing very, very uneven surfaces. And there's many occasions already exist where this subsidence already threatening the oil extraction infrastructure. Heading north, the Trans-Alaska Pipeline leads us out of the mountains and across the frozen Arctic tundra, a region of stunning natural beauty. Then we pull into Deadhorse, and the contrast couldn't be greater. It's one big muddy mess and much warmer than further south. The Dalton Highway ends in Deadhorse. At its only stop, the General Store. Terry Underhill is one of the few women in Deadhorse. She runs the store, and like everyone here, comes from the south. She flies into work for two weeks, then has two weeks off. That's the rhythm of life here. She tells us she's a big fan of Donald Trump, like everyone here. We ask why. Obama made it so you can't drill offshore, which killed us. And he outlawed a lot of stuff. He put a lot of regulations on everything, which made it to where they couldn't do anything. And then when Trump came along and lifted all the regulations and let us drill offshore again, everything started opening up again. So it was almost dead. I mean, it was like a ghost town. But now Deadhorse has been brought back to life, and work has returned. The workers' camps are fully booked. The huge containers stand on stilts, like everything here that's built on or in the permafrost. Because the land here lies just above sea level, and in summer the upper layers of permafrost keep melting more and more, gravel is spread to stabilize the ground. The question is, how long will all this hold? All this infrastructure built to extract more material, which will be eventually burned, and it will accelerate warming, which will increase the rate of thawing of permafrost, and will make more and more problems for the infrastructure, which design and build to extract these goods. So that's kind of irony here. We board a private plane for supplies to get a better overview of the situation. The oil companies won't let us film their operations, even though we'd approached them weeks ago. Over hundreds of kilometers, huge plants come into view. They're built into the slowly warming permafrost, all connected by the pipeline, which runs through this swampy landscape. Even offshore, in the middle of the Arctic Ocean, there are drilling platforms. Bob, our pilot, tells us normally there'd be ice here. But he says this year, things have changed. All summer, you can see I'm like fresh up against the shore. It's very unusual. It's the first year that I have not seen the ice all summer. Bob says it keeps getting warmer here. We wonder if the instability of the ground isn't already causing problems. Already on the infrastructure in the oil fields? Yes. But it's not official information. And they ask us not to talk about it. But yes, they have problems. And that's why maybe they're selling. They're selling PPEs. PPEs gone from North Slope. Oil giant BP is withdrawing from Alaska entirely — even though more and more oil fields are being discovered and opened up for drilling. Our journey around the Arctic Circle ends here, in the Alaskan oil fields. For some, they're the promise of a brighter future. For others, they're part of the problem. We've traveled thousands of kilometers through this immense, isolated region. A world that's warming more quickly than any other on Earth. A world that will determine the future of humanity. The huge demand for raw materials and climate change are making life more unpredictable by the day. Should the permafrost and ice crust disappear, our world will be a different one. And the knowledge acquired here over the generations is already losing its significance. Here, in the Arctic.