Activists journey to "ground zero" for global warming.

After an arduous journey across the Arctic ice, on February 28, 2000, eight Greenpeace activists constructed Ice Camp Sirius on the frozen Arctic Ocean to monitor and protest the construction of BP Amoco's controversial offshore oil project, Northstar.

Plane lands with supplies.

Ice Camp Sirius

Equipped with polar survival gear and state-of-the-art communications equipment, the activists lived in small tents for 15 days while they prepared a runway and waited for a DC-3 cargo plane to bring supplies for the camp. Once the plane was able to land on the ice, the activists set up the camp one mile from Northstar's construction site. (See the inventory list for Ice Camp Sirius.)

Aerial view of Ice Camp Sirius.

"It certainly feels cold here," remarked Greenpeace campaigner Dan Ritzman, one of the activists who helped set up the camp. "Yet the reality is that Alaska and the western Arctic is warming three to five times faster than the planet as a whole, and BP's Northstar project will only make global warming worse."

Northstar Patrols

BP workers dig pipeline trench.

From their ice camp, the eight activists are keeping close watch on construction of the Northstar project. BP Amoco is constructing Seal Island, an artificial drilling platform, by blasting thousands of tonnes of gravel from beneath the Kuparuk river bed, transporting it to the Seal Island site and dumping it into the Arctic Ocean. BP is also digging a trench beneath the ocean and laying a dangerous, untested sub-seabed pipeline that exposes the fragile Arctic environment to an up-to one-in-four chance of a major oil spill.

Wind and Solar

Adjusting a wind turbine.

The camp consists of two 4.5 x 6 x 2.75 meter quonset huts. One is primarily for accommodations, and the other is divided into a work area and a kitchen/common area. The power is being supplied primarily by five wind generators supplemented by solar panels and a rarely used backup generator.

Inside the kitchen/working hut.

When asked what the conditions were like up in the Arctic -- particularly while living in small tents -- Ritzman replied, "Well, contact lenses would crack from the cold -- one guy up here lost four -- the viewfinder on the camera froze because of the cold, and I've been told I have frostbite on my cheek ... But the Northern Lights up here are spectacular, and there's really no other option than for us to be here right now trying to stop BP's Arctic oil."

The sleeping hut is crowded.

Conditions in the huts are crowded. Tanya Popp from New Zealand laughs "Apart from all the equipment kept inside the two huts, you get eight people and all the clothes we need to wear (even to go to the toilet!!), it is pretty crowded and it is frustrating and sometimes amusing trying to find gloves, hats, neck gaiters, socks, jackets etc... in amongst the jumble of everyone else's."

Wind-powered Apple Hut near Northstar.

In addition to the camp itself, the activists have erected a portable fibreglass "Apple Hut" near Seal Island, the main Northstar construction site. The Apple Hut is partially heated, has communications equipment and is powered by a wind turbine.

Life in Ice Camp Sirius is falling into a bit of a routine now - with late night watch, early breakfast, Northstar monitoring at the Apple Hut, snowmobile patrols along the pipeline construction route, the almost daily 6 pm sound of the dynamite blasts at BP's gravel mine, and endless shovelling to keep drifting snow blown by the ever-present Arctic wind from blocking the hut entrances.

A bulldozer on Seal Island.

Nevertheless, the campers are well aware that the situation is anything but routine: BP Amoco is moving quickly to construct the first offshore oil project in the Arctic Ocean. As camp leader Henk Haazen said when he returned to the camp after being banned from the area for a few weeks following his arrest for talking to a BP security guard: "When I left 3 weeks ago they were cutting the sea ice away and dumping the gravel into this hole. Now on the same place there is a 20 foot high gravel island with cranes all over it. It is scary to see what they can do in such a short time."