Camping on Sea Ice with Whale Hunters

Overheard at National Geographic

National Geographic

Science, Society & Culture

4.5 • 10.1K Ratings

🗓️ 11 May 2021

⏱️ 25 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Every spring Inupiaq hunters camp on the sea ice north of the Arctic Circle, in hopes of capturing a bowhead whale to share with their village. But as global warming accelerates ice melt, it threatens the tribe’s 4,000-year-old tradition. National Geographic photographer Kiliii Yuyan recounts the five years he spent documenting these whale hunters, including one harrowing experience when the sea ice groaned—and then collapsed underneath them. For more information on this episode, visit nationalgeographic.com/overheard. Want more? Learn more about bowhead whales and hear their recordings of their wild sounds. And take a look at our in-depth coverage on the challenges facing polar bears in the Arctic. To see Kiliii’s stunning photography and short film about the Inupiaq people and their whale hunting traditions, Nat Geo subscribers can check them out in an online story, titled “Meet the Bowhead Whale Hunters of Northern Alaska.” You can also follow Kiliii on Instagram where you can see amazing portraits he’s taken of native people, wildlife and kayaks that he built himself. If you like what you hear and want to support more content like this, please consider a National Geographic subscription. Go to natgeo.com/exploremore to subscribe today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	In Evil is an amazing word for something terrifying. It is when the pack ice that is floating
0:14.5	on the other side of the ocean gets pushed by the wind and it comes in and impacts the
0:19.0	ice that we're standing on.
0:21.4	This is photographer Keely Rien. In 2018, he was on his first National Geographic assignment
0:28.3	north of the Arctic Circle near Utkeagvik, Alaska. He was documenting the bohade whale
0:34.7	hunting rituals of the Anupiac people. And to do this, he camped with the native hunters
0:40.1	for weeks on Arctic ice, where temperatures stable of freezing and there's nothing but
0:44.7	ice and sea for miles.
0:46.8	There was one wailing season when we happened to put our camp on a place where we knew
0:50.7	that the ice was a little unstable, that there was a crack in the ice between the land
0:56.8	and where we were.
0:58.8	So Keely shared the story of this journey in other adventures with our senior editor Eli
1:03.8	Chin. Hey Eli, welcome to the microphone or dragging you from behind your editor's desk
1:09.5	and throwing you in the mix here. This sounds like a crazy story.
1:12.8	Yeah, it is Peter. So that day, Keely had been camping with a wailing crew on sea ice
1:19.0	of all places.
1:20.0	Yeah, this sounds really dicey.
1:22.0	Oh, totally. I mean, Keely's thrilled to be there, but all sorts of things can go
1:26.4	wrong.
1:27.4	And so we kind of were always had someone going back and forth to check on this little crack
1:31.3	in the ice and make sure that we weren't going to crack off and just float away somewhere,
1:35.6	which definitely happens.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from National Geographic, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of National Geographic and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.