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Jacob Adams, Sr., Interview 1

Jacob Adams, Sr. was interviewed on July 11, 2008 by Matthew Druckenmiller in Barrow, Alaska. Craig George was another interviewer for part of the interview. This interview was part of Matthew's research for a Ph.D. in Snow, Ice and Permafrost Geophysics from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. For his project, he mapped the trails built by whalers to their camps at the edge of the sea ice and talked with local residents about ice conditions, whale camps, and trail building. Results of his research can be found in his dissertation Alaska Shorefast Ice: Interfacing Geophysics With Local Sea Ice Knowledge and Use (2011). In this interview, Jacob talks about the ice conditions, trails, camp locations and whaling in Barrow during the 2008 spring season.

Digital Asset Information

Archive #: Oral History 2013-25-10

Project: Sea Ice in Northern Alaska
Date of Interview: Jul 11, 2008
Narrator(s): Jacob Adams, Sr.
Interviewer(s): Matthew Druckenmiller, Craig George
Transcriber: Joan O'Leary
Location of Interview:
Funding Partners:
Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Coastal Marine Institute, North Pacific Research Board
Alternate Transcripts
There is no alternate transcript for this interview.
Slideshow
There is no slideshow for this person.

After clicking play, click on a section to navigate the audio or video clip.

Sections

Location of trail on the sea ice

Thin ice, cracks, ice breakage, and ice safety,

Trail building

Observing the ice and deciding where to put trail

Pulling back from the lead edge to safe ice

Ice conditions good for whaling and safe for butchering

Abandoning a trail

Ice break off and ice lifting and effect of wind and current

Comparing ice conditions with other years

Grounded ice, and water temperature

Effect of wind

Lack of multi-year ice

Presence of ice in summer

Use of maps and satellite imagery

Location of trail and camp on the ice

Click play, then use Sections or Transcript to navigate the interview.

After clicking play, click a section of the transcript to navigate the audio or video clip.

Transcript

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So this is an interview on September, no, that’s not right, July 11th with Jacob Adams in Barrow.

So which trails did you hunt on this year?

JACOB ADAMS: We were in number seven on this map.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And why did you choose to put your trail there?

JACOB ADAMS: Well, we generally look for -- for what might be out there at the edge of the ice, sort of like maybe a point on the ice or something else you figure out that whales could generally pass by.

You know, that’s what we look for initially. Then when we start breaking trail we look for areas that are basically flat and low ridges where we could pass through.

Before we start breaking the ice we usually walk ahead, and then try to find the best areas to break trail at. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: So that’s basically what we look for out there. Or some thick ice that's going to hold well.

We also kind of watch for areas that might have thin ice that we don’t want to cross.

We’re looking for stable ice that's not going move out or break up easily.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And did you find those -- the conditions that you prefer this year when you were building trail?

JACOB ADAMS: Basically we did, except for one area because some young ice had formed over in March.

There was one area that we had to go across to get to the edge of the ice and that ice was -- when we first checked it in March was about -- about a foot thick and then when we got out there, it was about a couple of feet maybe. Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: On this -- on this Sikuliaq here?

JACOB ADAMS: On the Sikuliaq here.

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: There's a big chunk of Sikuliaq there.

CRAIG GEORGE: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: When we first got to it and -- I checked it was about in mid-March. We checked the thickness of that Sikuliaq and there was about a foot.

And by the time we got out there it was probably a couple of feet.

CRAIG GEORGE: Huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, I was -- I was out there with Billy Adams, I think. He took me out there to -- to run this equipment.

CRAIG GEORGE: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And we -- so we measured across this whole -- this stretch of ice.

Did you actually establish a camp on that ice?

JACOB ADAMS: Yes, we did. We had a camp out on the ice.

But I think there was one area where it might have been less thick towards the east end of it, cause when we first got out there, there was some open water back over here somewhere.

But this side of it was pretty --

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah. there's a small ridge there, I guess.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, there was some solid ice at the edge.

CRAIG GEORGE: Could I ask a question? MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: Jake, if -- if this gets -- if this gets hit by -- the Siku comes in and hits it, wouldn’t this all break?

JACOB ADAMS: Not necessarily.

CRAIG GEORGE: Huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Unless there's been existing crack, but, you know, that young ice is pretty resilient.

CRAIG GEORGE: Huh. Okay.

JACOB ADAMS: Kind of like --

CRAIG GEORGE: Plastic.

JACOB ADAMS: Plastic, yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: Interesting. Well, that’s -- that’s interesting.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Well, did this ice out here that you described did that last throughout the entire length of the whaling season?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, there was some thicker ice along the edge.

Well, I guess, eventually some really heavy ice hit it and broke it up.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: It did.

JACOB ADAMS: Pretty good.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Was that before or after you guys catch your whale?

JACOB ADAMS: Some of it happened before we'd gotten a whale and some of it happened after it.

CRAIG GEORGE: Hm.

JACOB ADAMS: 'Cause what had happened was basically two, three of us crews broke that trail and we ended up with about a dozen whaling crews using our trail. But --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: When you build a trail out to -- out to the edge and you look at the conditions towards the edge like in this example you have this, you know, this ice was one foot thickness,

do you think about where to pull your camp back towards -- if something -- if bad conditions arise?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, I definitely want to pull back beyond that -- beyond that Sikuliaq area.

Far enough in where it won’t break up that easily if there's some heavier ice up here that --

I was there and then we ended up putting up our boats in that flat area right here. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Just was felt that was strong enough in here you wouldn’t break up everything.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So back in here is where you kept your boats when you weren't out there.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

CRAIG GEORGE: I think he said a little further out. Not only back here -- or where was it Jake? Show us.

JACOB ADAMS: Where we put up --

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Up here right at the edge of this flat -- CRAIG GEORGE: Okay. JACOB ADAMS: -- area. CRAIG GEORGE: You're right. So up in here.

JACOB ADAMS: Ending up putting up -- And then we pulled back.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Well, and when you were building this trail, how much work did it take?

JACOB ADAMS: How much work? You have to ask Billy that?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Well, we just -- basically Billy and his uncle Jonathan working on it.

But sometimes in the first week of March we started helping. By the time they got far enough along where we’re hitting that flat ice -- that flattening ice.

Especially broke kind of a lesser -- smaller trail because just we were concerned get the trail done. We were going to back and smooth it out and make it flat and another crew helped us out.

But it took probably about a couple of weeks maybe. There's one area in here that was kind of rough. They weren’t all that high, but some jumbled up ice. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Gotta smooth out.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: If you compare this year to previous years, was it more work this year or about average?

JACOB ADAMS: Oh, I think it was a little less work this year.

And it seemed like the ice was -- at least for the shorefast ice was kind of much -- probably thicker than previous years when we've been out there.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And when you are making this trail this year did you have an idea of how safe this was?

Did you have like a prediction on how this ice would -- would hold up throughout the year?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, we throughout the year look at the ice. See if it's -- now, if there's any cracks or broken up areas we want to avoid those, but we also want to look at --

always look at the ice during the course of the winter see where the ice is formed and -- and ice that hasn’t moved probably much stronger in areas that we want to consider for making a trail. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: It's just not something that we see in April or March -- MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Go out and place a trail and start watching it.

And the ice starts forming and the ice starts getting thicker and we see where some of the ice is jumbling up -- pressure ridges being made.

CRAIG GEORGE: Jake, do you -- do you look at where the, you know, the Iiguaqs are? Does that matter?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, we also look at those Iiguaqs.

I guess some of them, you know, just all broken up and -- and they sometimes the -- where the two -- the ice meets doesn't freeze solid all the way.

CRAIG GEORGE: Bad weld. JACOB ADAMS: So you got to be mindful of those. CRAIG GEORGE: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Where a crack may exist.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Did you have any of those along your trail this year?

JACOB ADAMS: We didn’t notice any.

CRAIG GEORGE: Huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And when you guys were camped out there, were there any points throughout the year where you had to pull back up from the lead because of conditions?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. Yeah, there -- we did that several times.

They pulled back when the ice starts moving in. Or the ice pack starts moving in.

Because this is probably one of the years we didn’t spend that -- a lot of -- whole lot of time out there either.

Just a period of time when it was really windy so -- I don’t know must be 10 days or something like that and then --

CRAIG GEORGE: Then you went out and got a whale? JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. CRAIG GEORGE: And that was it, yeah.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So what -- what was the date that you got your whale? JACOB ADAMS: Pardon?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: What date did you get your whale?

JACOB ADAMS: May -- what was it -- May 4th.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So fairly early on.

JACOB ADAMS: No, it was later than that.

CRAIG GEORGE: I've got the date. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Okay.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, it was May 6th, something like that.

CRAIG GEORGE: May 6th or 7th, maybe.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And when you guys were -- you’ve already briefly mentioned it when you described this ice out here, but the conditions at the lead were they -- were they good for whaling?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, they were good for whaling, because what we want to see is some flat areas where the whales get under the ice and turn around and come back out.

CRAIG GEORGE: I have a question. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. Go ahead.

CRAIG GEORGE: Jake, I guess that Sikuliaq was about two feet. Do you remember what it was? Two and a half feet, I think I remember.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, something like that.

CRAIG GEORGE: Is that -- how big a whale can you pull up on that?

JACOB ADAMS: Oh --

CRAIG GEORGE: Could you get a 40-footer up on it?

JACOB ADAMS: I think so, yeah. CRAIG GEORGE: Really.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: But not a 50-footer?

JACOB ADAMS: No.

CRAIG GEORGE: Okay.

JACOB ADAMS: Something close to a 40-foot.

CRAIG GEORGE: So you’re kind of obligated --

JACOB ADAMS: Cause one year we pulled up a whale and ice was piled over there was maybe about that thick.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: About a foot and a half.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, I mean the ice wasn’t very thick, but we kind of looked for a spot where some of the ice has slid over and --

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So you -- CRAIG GEORGE: Did you catch that? MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: -- try to pull your whale from where the ice had rafted?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. It was rafted over --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh. JACOB ADAMS: Something like that, and --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh. Yeah. And your whale this year was -- how large was it?

JACOB ADAMS: Thirty foot.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Thirty foot. And you had no problem pulling it up.

CRAIG GEORGE: No. Huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And so you guys didn’t have to abandon your trail and start a new one at all this year, is that correct?

JACOB ADAMS: No, we didn’t abandon the trail. Somehow I think it broke up.

Some of it broke up before we got the whale and had to redo the trail from around here to get to the edge.

CRAIG GEORGE: Huh. That's -- It was a west wind, and it got hit. A little bit.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Hm.

CRAIG GEORGE: I guess, was it west wind?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah, I thought there was. Yeah.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: You mean later in the season? You mean after you had gotten your whale?

JACOB ADAMS: Before we got the whale.

CRAIG GEORGE: Were you going to ask what conditions caused it to break off? Was that part of the question?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, well, it certainly can be. I mean, I think towards the end I wanted to ask about just in general when --

when you're out there what are the conditions that make you think, okay, this ?

JACOB ADAMS: That it's going to break off? MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: We got some really strong currents and the water level rising.

Sometimes it's just lifted up too much to areas where there's heavier -- heavier ice and that -- and the edge of that center ice and the heavier ice are lifting it up.

The water rising is lifting it up cause sometimes the other ice is too heavy for the water to lift too much and then it breaks. Breaks a crack and --

CRAIG GEORGE: That's -- Is that the Katak -- you guys call that Katak or something?

JACOB ADAMS: Or some times after you got a real strong west winds and a big current moving for a long time then the current changes and your water level starts dropping too much

where some heavier ice and the lighter ice is dropping because of the water level dropping and breaks right there, too.

CRAIG GEORGE: Okay.

JACOB ADAMS: But most of the time what we’re seeing here was when people got stranded out there was really strong current from lifting up the ice.

CRAIG GEORGE: Is it the -- JACOB ADAMS: From the south.

CRAIG GEORGE: The south, the Qaisagnaq, is that more dangerous than the other one?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. Qaisagnaq is more dangerous than the Piurġaġnaq.

CRAIG GEORGE: For -- for breaking ice?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. For ice breaking up.

CRAIG GEORGE: Interesting. Alright. That’s kind of essential.

JACOB ADAMS: Or there might have been some old cracks along there somewhere that --

CRAIG GEORGE: Goes -- goes active.

JACOB ADAMS: Where you notice and when that ice starts lifting up a little bit that crack breaks and then current --

CRAIG GEORGE: Interesting.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Well, wasn’t -- just -- this is my interpretation and I’m probably -- you can correct me, but the ice that you were on -- had your camp on, isn’t that the type of ice that could lift --

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. It could. Cause it's much lighter than some of the ice that are --

this whole area is much lighter than ice in here. It could -- if you towing long periods of time if you have some strong current from here and water level rising. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: It could create a crack and push it out.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: But did you see any of those rises in water level when you were out there?

JACOB ADAMS: Not really. Not -- We didn’t spend a whole lot of time out there.

CRAIG GEORGE: Interesting. I’m going to excuse myself. I’ll get that date.

Did you get -- did we give you the form for your whale -- all the information? I think I did.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: You’ve got -- but anyway I’ll grab that for you.

JACOB ADAMS: Great. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

CRAIG GEORGE: Quyanaq, Jake. It's interesting.

JACOB ADAMS: Sure.

CRAIG GEORGE: You're the man. JACOB ADAMS: Alright.

CRAIG GEORGE: I'm going to step back.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. Thanks, Craig.

CRAIG GEORGE: Yeah, interesting.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And one of the things that I heard somebody in town say was that this year that the currents were a little unusual because the current from the northeast was -- was stronger than normal.

I don’t know if you experienced that or not.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh. Could be because we were getting a lot of strong east winds.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: And that water starts pushing away from the -- started the water level starts coming down and the current moving with the wind.

Because we notice that all the time even in the summer. You get prolonged east winds, currents start shifting.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: And if there's no big storms over in western end of North Slope, especially if there's nothing pushing up from the Bering Strait.

All that water getting pushed.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. So in general --

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, that’s what I noticed too when you usually look at that -- at that satellite imagery.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: I notice there's a whole lot less water over north of Point Hope this spring.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Less water?

JACOB ADAMS: Because -- less water because there's more ice.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Oh, yeah, open -- open water. JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: The result of not a whole lot of mov -- being pushed north.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um. Well, in general, how did the shore ice off Barrow this year compare to previous years?

JACOB ADAMS: I think there was -- this year kind of felt it was much more stable than some of the previous years the ice conditions.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, I noticed --

JACOB ADAMS: And it wasn’t all that far out. This year it was fairly close.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Hm.

JACOB ADAMS: I think -- I don’t what -- it was four miles something like that.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um. Four miles to where you were --

JACOB ADAMS: Huh? MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: -- camped here? This is about four miles out. JACOB ADAMS: Huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Previous years we were looking at six. But we used the area where we are at so it was much more stable than previous years. I don’t know about out here.

Over here I don’t think it was all that stable. You see a lot of thinner ice.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And what about in terms of -- when you say it was stable, is that --

is that because of a lot of grounded ridges or just a few that are really grounded well?

JACOB ADAMS: It's like just generally more grounded ice stuck out there.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So along your trail where was the ice grounding?

JACOB ADAMS: Oh, it was probably, oh, somewhere around here. Around that --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Further in. That -- Yeah, we had some long periods of cool weather this winter.

It was like it's -- that helps in making the ice much more stable. But I don’t know what the ice -- water temperature was doing.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh. JACOB ADAMS: Below that.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, I don’t know if you’ve seen this little blue triangle is that site that we put out onto the ice in the wintertime. JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And it measures water temperature. But how that compares to the temperatures down here I’m not sure.

JACOB ADAMS: Maybe pretty much the same. That water is getting pushed from the south, but it's getting a lot of push from that way probably makes a whole lot of difference.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: They have that out there all winter?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah, we put it -- well, not all winter. We put it in on February 6th. JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And then we took it out on June 16th, I think. So a good part of the year. JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And I don’t know if you’ve ever seen that data, but it's on the Internet.

You can see how fast the ice is growing. It's just -- it tells you how thick the ice grew, you know, the level ice. JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: How thick it's grown. But it doesn’t tell you anything about --

JACOB ADAMS: How is the temperature doing?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Well, to tell you the truth I don’t know without looking at the -- at the data. I haven’t really been too concerned about looking at the temperature.

I know -- the only thing that I noticed this year and last year that in the middle of winter, I think it might have been March or late February, there -- there was a period of time where there was really warm water --

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: -- coming up through here and that’s really the only thing I remember. These periods of warm water.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: I don’t know if that happens every year, but it certainly happened the last two years.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, well, I second last -- I don't know how many years that kind of suspect there's warmer water moving up and causing the ice be thinner.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Then previous years. Because we notice that over time the ice thickness has changed quite a bit.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Did you notice any of this warm water underneath your trail causing a problem?

JACOB ADAMS: Not this year, but some other years where it wears out the ice from the bottom, makes it thinner.

I think that -- that just happened, you know, there's prolonged periods with some warmer temperatures it just kind of wears out that -- the ice.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And so this year you -- what did you say about the winds during the time you were out there whaling?

JACOB ADAMS: Pardon?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: The winds -- what was your summary on how the winds actually created the good conditions for whaling?

JACOB ADAMS: It’s like a lot of -- You know, as long as we got some east winds there's -- and this was one of the years where a lot of whales were traveling close to the edge of the ice for some reason.

But at that period of time where there's a lot of wind from the east. it didn’t allow us to stay out there.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: You say the winds from the east didn’t allow you to stay out there? JACOB ADAMS: Pardon?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: You say that the winds from the east didn’t allow you to stay out there or --

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, because they were fairly strong winds going up in the 20, 25 mile an hour winds.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: That's dangerous because it can blow the ice out?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, when it blows the ice out or the water gets too rough.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Oh, yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: So you're out there and --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Did you notice anything unusual this year with the ice?

JACOB ADAMS: No, I don’t think so. Nothing unusual out there.

Except, you know, we hardly ever see that multi-year ice anymore. It's -- they use fresh water ice, but you have to haul water down there.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Did you see any multi-year ice this year?

JACOB ADAMS: I haven't seen any. There's nothing really where we’re at.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: What about this ice that is out here now? These big things of ice that came in recently? JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Does any of that look like multi-year ice?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Big chunks of ice are basically where all of the kind of this active tops where they’re smoothed out and all that salt was kind of drained out. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Basically it was chance of fresh water ice.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: So you think some of this stuff that's out here now is probably multi-year ice?

JACOB ADAMS: Could be. I don’t know I haven’t looked at that closely. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Something is holding that ice.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah.

JACOB ADAMS: Out there, unless there -- there's that ice moving in or --

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh. I went out there yesterday in one of the BASC boats and climbed up onto the ice that’s out there and I couldn’t tell.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: I don’t have enough experience, but it looked like it could be multi-year ice and maybe it wasn’t multi-year ice though. I’m not sure.

JACOB ADAMS: Probably yeah, I don’t know that pack ice follows just any shift is in. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, we’re getting some pretty good winds out there. That ice ain’t moving.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. It’s --

JACOB ADAMS: This way currents are shifting the pack ice. Where it's -- Have they done flights out there or -- ?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Have they? Well, we did a flight earlier in the year. JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Before whaling season started to see where all the multi-year ice was. And at that point it was like 60, 70 miles north of here.

But looking at the satellite images it looks like there's multi-year ice to the -- to the northeast of here, but -- JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: In the satellite image I can’t tell if there's multi-year ice off of Barrow or not. That's why I was curious about this stuff.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah, something's holding it out there.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. So is that a good thing or -- JACOB ADAMS: Pardon?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Is that a good thing or a bad thing to have this ice stick around in the summertime?

JACOB ADAMS: If it holds in there a little bit longer we'll be able to get our bearded seals. In previous years, the ice went out and never came back. People hardly got any.

That's one of the bad things about this ice starting to move out and doesn’t come back. Tough on seal hunters and walrus hunters.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. I think those are all the questions I have about the ice.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: But I had two -- two other questions that I wanted to ask.

As part of this project we -- we're studying the ice, we want to provide something that's useful to, you know, the people of Barrow.

JACOB ADAMS: Uh-huh. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: And that’s why I was helping Craig make these maps.

And I was wondering if for one is it helpful and also if -- if you have any suggestions on how to do it differently.

Because we -- we can certainly always do things differently next year.

JACOB ADAMS: I can’t think of anything that would -- would help.

Any suggestions that might change the way you guys are doing things.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Are there other things that you look at when you're whaling like satellite images, you said you used those?

JACOB ADAMS: Satellite images, yeah. We can make use of them if they were in -- I don't know how refined this stuff is when you get it blown up a little bit more, but -- I mean looking at it, you know, probably get a pretty good idea where you want to go and how the edge of the ice is.

I mean, for instance, generally you want to look for something like this or that or over here.

See if just when the whales are traveling they're usually hitting that or that or over here.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: These little bays you mean or --

JACOB ADAMS: No, it's just kind of a point.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Oh, the points.

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um. So you guys try to get at a point?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Every day, huh?

JACOB ADAMS: Yeah. That's where we expect the whales are going to hit. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Huh.

JACOB ADAMS: These points along the edge.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: In comparison to where you have put your trails in the past, are you -- do you go to different places each year or are you -- you're usually off town?

JACOB ADAMS: Oh, previous couple of years we were out here.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Huh.

JACOB ADAMS: But, that is always a problem with that ice over here.

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Yeah. JACOB ADAMS: Always closing in.

Last year we had to break trail or not -- break camp -- sometimes we broke camp three times a day because the ice would move back in. I forget I got --

They won’t do that again so we want to get over here where at least when the ice is sitting over here it's moving out over here. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Don’t have to break camp as much.

This up here you’re looking at ice moving from that way or moving from that way. You know, it's closing -- it's already good area, but to hunt whales it's just having to deal with that ice out there.

And also we look at the -- the conditions -- or not conditions -- yeah sometimes conditions of the ice here and see if there's any points out there.

Sometimes this is fairly close and this one is further out. MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Uh-huh.

JACOB ADAMS: Where the whales traveling further out to -- MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: Um.

JACOB ADAMS: -- to get the ice over here, yeah.

Anything else?

MATTHEW DRUCKENMILLER: No, I think that’s it. JACOB ADAMS: Alright.