It is with great sadness and regret that I find myself in the position to have witnessed and documented what is likely the end of the great caribou herds of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

    Through the course of my expedition, having lived an entire season within the 1002 region, I have identified a serious biological threat to the caribou. Through the observation and documentation of the post calving aggregation behavior and movement of caribou, it becomes clear that this threat, as impacted by proposed drilling and related development, signifies the probable demise and extirpation of caribou from the Arctic coastal plain within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. As there exists upon the northern Arctic slope of Alaska no other wilderness refuge free of development pressure, it is unlikely that a suitable alternative environment is available to the tens of thousands of caribou that seek the sanctuary offered of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

    I would emphasize that I am not an environmentalist. I do not place the needs of animals and inanimate objects above the value of human life.  It is exactly the precious value of human life that I seek to defend.  It is through the course of my travels and work that I now understand the dependency of humanity’s success upon a connection with the natural world.  It is the existence of pure and wild space, intact, whole of all its’ components as the equilibrium of a natural world dictates, that affords man the inner view and understanding of exactly who and what he is.

     It is this connection that has run as thread through the course of human history. Founded upon the observation and connection with the natural world, a world offering the continuity and freedom of life in contrast to the contradiction that lies within the failings of man, the greatest works of human kinds most notable philosophers endure as a testament to wild and natural space.

     The earthy frontier no longer exists. The refuge of true wilderness is the last remaining vestige of an unmolested natural world that affords humanity its’ center.

     It is this connection that stands at risk in the fall of life within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It is humanity that dares to suffer of its’ own hand. It is our children that will inherit a world that has lost its’ identity to the madness of greed.

     The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge stands as the battleground waged for man’s very soul.