Community Outreach
Much of the day was spent researching maps at the Tuzzy Library and planning for the community outreach event next week. The plan is to have an event at the library that promotes the Teen CERT (Community Emergency Response Teams) program offered through FEMA. Anne and I are hopeful to launch the Teen CERT program at next year’s Summer camp hosted by Ilisagvic College in Barrow. The college hosts 3 or 4 different camps every Summer, with around 5-7 kids in each camp, and the North Slope Borough pays for the students to go. This may not seem like a big deal but a round-trip plane ticket to Barrow from another village in the North Slope could easily cost around $1000… multiply that by 20 then factor in money for room and board, and that’s a lot of money that goes into the Summer camp. Anyways, we meet tomorrow with the director’s of Ilisagvic’s Summer camp to see if they are interested. Our goal is to pitch the program and convince them that it’s important stuff because, well, it is important stuff!
Our unwritten plan for the event is to make it fun – games, songs, and prizes that deal with risk management and we can’t forget FREE FOOD. I think food usually does the trick at bringing in the most people.
What ‘s a Utilidor for?
Other than our library work today, we went on a tour of the largest wooden structure in Alaska – that’s the Barrow utilidor. Don’t google that just yet, I’ll explain to you what that is. The utilidor is the underground, wooden chamber that houses all of the utilities for Barrow. These utilities include:
* potable water
* sewage
* telephone service lines
* TV Cable service lines
* Fiber optic service
* Electric service
It's pretty incredible that all of the city's utilities run through this utilidor, built in 1984. Photo courtesy of BUECI.
The above ground utilities run between two parts of the city.
In other words, you can’t bury these utilities like you would in most communities. This goes back to the permafrost in the Arctic. Water pipes would freeze on any day in the Summer if they were buried OR if the water was heated then it would result in thawing tundra – this would result in unstable ground. Both scenarios are bad so the result is an open wooden chamber to house the utilities underground. Warm air is blown down the utilidor and the water is kept between 40º - 50º. Warm enough to prevent pipes from bursting and cool enough to not thaw the permafrost. On our tour today, however, we learned that the Winter in Barrow is so harsh that pipe-freezes are a daily occurrence. Workers are kept busy fixing these freezes all winter long. The fact still remains that this utilidor is a definite risk factor due to the fact that so many people depend on running water, electricity, and communication devices.
Why did the Lemming cross the road?
Once our work was finished for the day, we went to the BASC (Barrow Arctic Science Consortium) presentation of research on the Snowy Owl. We sat for an hour as a researcher described his 22-year research project and all of the information he has learned. Now, if only I could spot a snowy owl while we’re here in Barrow. I was fortunate enough to spot the primary food source in the snowy owl’s diet – anyone know what that is?
On my way to the library, I saw this little guy cross the road -- probably to get away from a snowy owl. Brown lemmings are the top food source for snowy owls.