Big Miracle by Tom Rose

Fairbanks runway after a brief stopover, he, like everyone else on the flight still felt an undiminished sense of wonder at the scenery passing beneath. Nothing but virgin magnificent wilderness, endless wilderness. For as far as he could see, forests of spruce and pine sprawled in every direction. There was the gaping winding Yukon River basin, lit by the dimming light of the northland’s setting sun. The Yukon was America’s longest and greatest river, half again the length of the Mississippi. All this greatness, he thought, untouched by the hand of man.
    The farther Weston flew, the terrain below grew sparser and more hostile. The heavily wooded wilderness thinned. As if a line was actually drawn in the earth, the vegetation vanished after crossing the imaginary Arctic Circle at sixty-seven degrees north latitude. Such extreme latitudes were more than even the hardiest trees could bear. Then, out of the white void emerged the stark pristine magnificence of the Brooks Mountain Range that formed the Arctic’s impregnable southern boundary. Only a small part of the 10,000-foot peaks that constituted the world’s northernmost and least explored mountain range was visible. Its tranquil countenance seemed to belie its creator’s desire to keep its uncharted peaks … well, uncharted. Many of those who had explored the dangerous peaks to unlock its hidden treasures never returned.
    As the plane began its descent, the wonder of where it would land outweighed Russ’s own experience of descending onto a sea of Arctic desolation. No matter how many times he had done so, Weston still thought they might be making an emergency landing on a frozen lake bed in the middle of the tundra. Then, there it was. A 7,000-foot runway built at the edge of the universe.
    Looking south as the aircraft taxied to the hangar, Russ saw the same expanse of white he saw from the air. Only the bizarre Buck Rogers look of the North Slope Borough television transmission site interrupted the bleak vision. It was the presence of this site that brought him back to reality. Stepping off the plane, Weston could not believe he had just traveled 1,200 miles without seeing a trace of man. It was sixty degrees colder in Barrow than in Anchorage. He awoke that morning prepared for just another day as an Anchorage television cameraman. The day ended as one of the most remarkable of his life.
    Biologists Craig George and Geoff Carroll were driving back to the Wildlife Department after sliding down their quota of greasy thirteen-dollar quarter-pounders at the local Burger Barn when they saw Oran descending the wrought-iron steps of Barrow’s city center, the airport hangar. Geoff and Craig were struck by the sight of the two strangers who accompanied him. Their bright ski clothes stood in marked contrast to the drab but warm look of the locals.
    Unaware of his own conspicuousness, Geoff stepped on the brakes, bringing his Dodge Caravan to a stop right in the middle of Ahkovak Street, one of Barrow’s busiest roadways. Ahkovak Street was crowded not with cars, of which there were few in Barrow, but with ski machines, and even these were infrequent so early in the season.
    A car in the Arctic often proved not worth the bother. It needed special heaters to keep the engine from freezing even as it ran . The brutal cold destroyed transmissions within weeks, not years. And if the owner ever wanted his car to start in the winter, he had to keep the engine running—sometimes for six straight months.
    The fact that Barrow sat atop the world’s largest oil field did not mean fuel came cheap. To the contrary, gas cost more in Barrow than anywhere else in America. Once drilled, the oil had to go all the way to Southern California for refinement into gasoline only to be tankered back to Alaska and then flown to Barrow aboard special aircraft. At three dollars a gallon in 1988 (the national average for unleaded was then ninety-five cents),