Big Miracle

by Tom Rose

  Snapping their jaws without regard for what they might bite, the dogs fought among themselves just for the chance to snatch human waste within seconds of it being deposited, oftentimes before a person had to chance to pull up his britches, requiring one to finish his business with one hand while flailing the club at the snarling dogs with the other. So the story goes.

  Lofty salaries and flashy bylines meant precious little to reporters assigned to Barrow. Here, skills perfected on the Outside were of little use. Those that considered long jet journeys arduous before arriving in Barrow actually looked forward to it when it was time to leave. This was not Johannesburg, Beijing, or even Beirut. There were no taxis outside the airport to whisk you to the comfortable superbly catered hotels you would call home for the duration of your story.

  There was little in Barrow to remind an Outsider of the world he left behind. Nothing seemed the same. There were no trees, no grass. There was nothing higher than the ground that was not put there by man. None of the earth exposed itself above the flat blanket covering of white that concealed the ground. If it weren’t for man, nothing would break the completely uniform terrain.

  Suddenly the world’s changeable attention focused on one of its most isolated places. Even with the miracle of instant satellite communication, Barrow seemed every bit as trapped in its harsh setting as the three whales were trapped under the ice. Three hundred and twenty miles above the Arctic Circle, each day survived was a miracle achieved. No one lived in a more unforgiving and hostile world, it seemed, than did the hearty Inupiat Eskimos.

  Until the media adopted the whales as their own, it would have been both impossible and inconceivable to save them. Because it was nature at work, most Barrowans did not see the point of trying to rescue the whales. But once the story went nationwide, the decision was made for them. They had been cast by their cultural betters from the world of television news to play the role of innocent and enlightened savages in this touchy-feely state of nature. If they could be made to help save the whales, what a story it would make. Premodern noble men in the glorious state of nature working hand in hand to save a fellow creature in the state of nature. If only.

  Whales stranded themselves for tens of thousands of years before the invention of satellite news gathering. They will continue to strand themselves for thousands more. Everyone assigned to the whales’ story quickly learned this was a nonstory, yet it was one the world was desperate to follow. It took on a life of its own, as media stories are wont to do.

  The power of television alone could not account for the spellbinding influence of this story. The herd instinct lead the news media to Barrow and that same herd instinct compelled us to darn near take the town over when we got there. When NBC found good grazing, everyone followed. The compelling struggle of the whales and those who worked hard to rescue them would lead news programs around the globe for almost two weeks. But no group of news directors could have created this huge amount of interest. That power belonged to the whales, their rescuers, and most important, the millions of people around the world who wanted them freed.

  Barrow natives never did figure out precisely how to deal with the arrival of the Outside. Isolationists argued that Outsiders wanted the Eskimo and his ancient way of life destroyed. Fortunately, there weren’t that many isolationists. Most Inupiat were smart enough to realize there was much in the modern world for them, too; that his life could be bettered and his prospects improved in the same ways progress helped everybody else. For the Eskimo, the real question was how to keep the best of his past alive without forgoing the benefits of progress.

  6

  The Tigress from Greenpeace

  Autumn 1988 marked the final days of Ronald Reagan’s presidency. America’s fortieth president had only a few months left in office until his second term expired. While the country was naturally preoccupied with the race to succeed him, there was still much left to do.

  No one knew this better than Interior Secretary Donald Hodel, who realized that the period right before the president left office was his own last and perhaps best chance to push some of Ronald Reagan’s most significant land management policies through Congress—expanded access to America’s abundant but off-limits energy resources chief among them.

  The oil companies promised drilling in the Arctic was safe and for twenty-plus years had proven it. Environmentalists countered that a single “blowout” at an offshore oil rig could spill millions of gallons of crude oil into a fragile ecosystem, causing catastrophic damage. Oil companies agreed with them. Offshore drilling was far more dangerous than onshore drilling. Yet when oil companies argued that the best way to mitigate the risk of off shore oil drilling was to increase onshore drilling, the environmental lobby opposed them. Environments argued then, and have argued ever since that the oil industry was bad and dangerous and therefore must be stopped.

  Despite President Reagan’s personal popularity, public opinion seemed to side with the environmentalists. Energy was still relatively affordable and still seemed abundant. These were the days before alternative media and the Internet. The editorial biases of the establishment media, represented by the big three television networks and The New York Times, still held sway, and made it extremely difficult to enact proposals to reasonably expand domestic energy production. One thing can be said for environmentalists in those days that cannot be said for them today: Back in 1988 not even the oil companies had a clue as to the true size and scope of energy resources beneath our waters and under the soil and land.

  Recent studies (2010) conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey suggest that the American Arctic (Alaska) could contain 90 billion barrels of oil; the second largest undiscovered petroleum reserve in the world. If true, this find would contain $8 trillion worth of oil at 2011’s average price of ninety-five dollars per barrel; $8 trillion that could be spent on and in America rather than exported to countries that hate us. Other experts say the oil fields off and under Alaska and its Arctic coast are much bigger still and could extend throughout the entire Arctic region and at twice the size of USGS estimates.

  With time running out, Hodel made one last effort to open up more of the U.S. continental shelf for limited offshore drilling. The biggest prize was Alaska’s Bristol Bay. Separating the Aleutian Islands from the Alaskan mainland, Bristol Bay served as the home to more than three-quarters of the world’s salmon, half the tuna, herring, halibut, and countless numbers of other commercial fish species. Supplying the world with more than a billion dollars’ worth of fish each year, Bristol Bay was and remains the backbone of Alaska’s commercial fishing industry.

  The oil industry and geologists believed that some of the world’s largest remaining undeveloped oil deposits lay just beneath Bristol Bay’s floor. The oil companies argued those reserves could be tapped safely without damaging America’s richest maritime region. From the oilman’s point of view, the quantity of oil and gas waiting to be drilled more than justified the risk. However, the Alaskan fishermen, whose livelihoods depended upon the bay’s renewable resources, were not so sure.

  But now, something funny happened. Rather than continue its public relations and media war against the fishing industry by accusing it of destroying Bristol Bay through “unsustainable” exploitation, Alaskan environmentalists, assisted in money and support by its allies in the Lower 48, now joined forces with their former commercial fishing opponents to oppose any efforts by the oil companies to even survey Bristol Bay to find out how much oil might be below the sea floor.

  Cindy Lowry was the Alaska field coordinator for Greenpeace, either the most famous or notorious of all environmentalist organizations, depending on one’s perspective. Although Greenpeace was created in 1972 to stop French atomic-weapon testing, its young group of left-wing firebrands burst into the world’s consciousness with their attention-grabbing stunts to save the whales. While their antics made for great TV, they were a bit late to the party. By the time Greenpeace showed up in the late 1970s, the whales were
already well on their way to recovery. They had long since been saved from extinction—not by environmentalists, but by the oil industry! You read that right. It was petroleum that saved the whales, not Greenpeace.

  Greenpeace etched its image using inflatable rubber dinghies. By placing themselves and their fragile rafts between the hulking keels of aging whaling ships and the whales they lumbered to kill, the daring two-man crews made a powerful impact on global opinion. By 1989, Greenpeace was a household name. Its two million members were active everywhere. From the North Pole to the South Pole, Greenpeacers fought for an ever-widening array of causes. Controversy was their calling card.

  To Cindy Lowry, Bristol Bay was more than a commercial fishery. In fact, she and her organization cut their teeth on fighting the fishing industry. It was the critical pathway for Alaska’s sea creatures. All the animals that migrated to and from Alaska depended on swimming through and living in a clean, viable Bristol Bay. Everyone could agree upon that.

  Lowry believed that if the oil industry were given rights to develop Bristol Bay, everything that lived in it or passed through it, including two-thirds of the world’s gray whales, could be at risk. Never much for understatement, Greenpeace’s line of opposition to exploration rights in the bay was that a rig “blowout” could wipe out entire species.

  For Cindy, it was the offensive to even weigh the commercial interests of people against the very survival of animals. The killing of whales, by whatever means, was never justifiable (did that extend to ice strandings?). Cindy Lowry’s job description was to stop any human activity anywhere it might threaten nonhuman activity—anywhere. She was a true believer.

  She didn’t trust many people, least of all conservatives. To her, the mere mention of Ronald Reagan’s name led to outrage. Bristol Bay first appeared as a target for energy development back in 1985. The Interior Department solicited bids to buy lease rights in the bay. The outcry against the plan to search for oil in the rich ecosystem was so great though that Secretary Hodel agreed to cancel the process with a caveat. Instead of voiding the bids outright, the Interior Department would keep them sealed in the event the current or next administration “changed its mind.”

  Three months before President Reagan was scheduled to leave office, almost everyone thought the issue of offshore oil drilling in wildlife areas was dead. Opposition was too great, support too meek. Reagan was opposed by his own vice president, George H. W. Bush, now the Republican candidate for president. Even oil companies had given up. But Donald Hodel did not. His office announced that the sealed bids would be opened and read at a hearing in Anchorage on October 11, 1988.

  Cindy Lowry’s distrust seemed to pay off. While no one else was prepared for the sudden change in administration policy, Cindy was. Three years earlier, she submitted Greenpeace’s own bid for lease rights in Bristol Bay. As her price for rights to drill in the bay, she offered the value of the marine life that Greenpeace predicted would be destroyed if the bay was opened up. Cindy was certain that if drilling went ahead, it would be the creatures of Bristol Bay that would pay the price, not the oil companies. How risking the billions of dollars needed to develop Bristol Bay did not constitute a risk for oil companies, Cindy did not say.

  Cindy didn’t consider herself a left-wing anti-everything rabble-rouser; none of them ever do. But the oil companies, Inupiat subsistence whalers, and legions of others she frequently tangled with thought that was precisely what she was. Yes, Cindy Lowry was a heart-on-her-sleeve, emotion-first-reason-second animal lover. She did not just admit it, she was proud of it. When not on “assignment,” she could easily be mistaken for a fashion-conscious banker. She looked younger than her thirty-eight years. There weren’t many limousines in Alaska, but in many ways Cindy Lowry was Alaska’s version of a limousine liberal. She dressed in the latest fashions, wore expensive perfumes, drank expensive coffees, drove a gas-guzzling Volvo, and had a great big dog named after the tallest mountain in North America, Denali. Outsiders knew it as Mount McKinley, named for an American president who sanctioned an expedition there.

  Lowry had only a few weeks to prepare for the October 11 hearing that would determine the fate of Bristol Bay and, in a sense, America’s energy future. Cindy prepared for the worst. So did the Mineral Management Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior (MMS), which held the hearing. They hired fifteen extra security guards to protect the proceedings and its participants from peaceful, nonviolent types like Cindy Lowry.

  Cindy dressed as she always did for professional functions. But hidden away in her black leather executive attaché case was a sleek megaphone probably bought at the Sharper Image. Before the doors were opened the security guards were warned to look out for her likes, not smartly dressed women. Suppressing a smirk, Cindy walked right past them to a seat at the back of the auditorium. She couldn’t believe it. As Alaska’s most notorious environmentalist, she not only expected trouble, but was hoping for it. Instead, no one even recognized her.

  The hearing was a big event. Controversy was all but assured. All the Anchorage media—the newspapers and the television and radio stations—were on hand to cover it. Earlier in the week, the Interior Department in Washington sensed trouble. They instructed the moderator to find whatever excuse he could not to open the Greenpeace bids. The tension was palpable. The moderator knew he wouldn’t get away with it, but orders were orders.

  Again, Cindy was ahead of the game. She had locked horns with the oil companies and used histrionics too many times before to know the hearing would not go as its sponsors wanted.

  She knew it was she, not they who were in charge. They were afraid of her. She was not afraid of them. She couldn’t lose—if she caused trouble and was expelled, she would claim to be the victim of a rigged process; that her free-speech rights were trampled. If she was permitted to stand her ground inside and lost, she could still make the same basic charge: the process was rigged.

  Cindy made sure she was flanked by friends who would protect her. Fellow activists and fishermen trying to defend their livelihoods sat next to Cindy on both sides. When the moderator announced that all bids would remain sealed, Cindy seamlessly transformed herself from well-behaved participant to activist loudmouth—literally. She slipped the high-powered megaphone she smuggled past security out of her briefcase.

  “What about the bids? Why aren’t you going to read the bids?” she demanded. The megaphone was louder than the auditorium’s public address system. “Why don’t you open the bids like the law requires?” The law, of course, required no such thing. But amid the hubub no one had the presence of mind to point that out. Hundreds of heads turned in her direction. Applause and cheers overtook the smattering of boos from Alaskans who favored development as strongly as Cindy opposed it.

  The security guards sprang to life. From all corners of the hall, they ran toward Cindy’s direction to stop her disruption and to restore order. They fought and struggled with the phalanx of burly fishermen who rose with broad chests to shield her. Did they know she opposed them, too? After a heated exchange, the guards overwhelmed their opposition and yanked Cindy out of her seat. The crowd jeered as the guards dragged her screaming from the hall. Camera crews captured it all for the evening news. Practice made perfect. It was a masterful performance.

  Outside, the media lined up to interview the hearing’s well-rehearsed animal-rights diva. The episode became that night’s lead story on all three Anchorage newscasts. After answering all the media’s questions, Cindy walked to her Volvo where her boyfriend, Kevin Bruce, was waiting. Kevin always tried to be on hand whenever Cindy planned any of her stunts in case he was needed to post bail. Knowing she was too upset to drive, he gave her a warm hug, took her keys, and drove her home.

  Make no mistake. Cindy Lowry didn’t oppose enjoying all the fruits developed and produced by the industries she made a living trying to close. On the way home, they stopped for drive-through Chinese takeout to eat while watching Todd Pottinger’s 11:00 P.M. news
cast from the comfort of their modern Anchorage condo, outfitted with all the latest accoutrements. They had expected Cindy’s expulsion to be the top story. The surprise came when they heard Pottinger report it as a major victory. The uproar she contrived had forced the MMS to cancel the hearing. The sealed bids went right back to the same vault where they had moldered for the last three years. Cindy and Greenpeace had won. For the moment at least, Cindy Lowry had helped keep Bristol Bay “safe.” She also helped keep safe, if not strengthen, the stranglehold that foreign regimes had on U.S. energy needs.

  While still a bit shaken by her ejection, Cindy’s face lit up. She basked in victory not for herself, but for her good friends the otters, seals, and whales of Bristol Bay. How sweet.

  Opponents sometimes accused Cindy Lowry of many terrible things, but none of her critics ever suggested that she generated publicity for her own purposes. Cindy Lowry was, heart and soul, an activist. She was a true believer and hard not to respect. Environmentalism was her life’s passion, often to Kevin’s chagrin. While her tactics were sometimes questioned, no one could question the sincerity of her motivation. She thought Alaska’s wilderness to be in grave danger. It wasn’t a passion she acquired. Cindy Lowry was born with it.

  By the time she was five, little Cindy was already cutting loose the fish her family caught on pleasure trips. The adults soon learned that if they ever wanted to eat any of their catch, Cindy was better left at home. By her tenth birthday, she displayed a dangerous willingness to use deadly force to protect animals. Patrolling to protect her Kansas farm against coyote poachers, little Cindy marched with her grandfather’s heavy shotgun slung over her tiny shoulder. Shoving her loaded gun’s double barrels into the marauding hunters’ stunned faces, she forced them to think twice before trespassing. Word of “that crazy Lowry kid” spread fast. Her militancy worked. The poachers never returned.