Alaskan Pipeline – The Trans-Alaska Pipeline System
“Part of the problem in Washington is that a lot of our Democratic friends, year after year, have tried to stand in the way of more energy production,” Vice President Dick Cheney told the New York Republic Committee on May 29th, 2008. “The plain truth is we can get a lot more energy here in America, and we can do it in an environmentally sound and friendly way.” He was, of course, talking about expanding drilling and excavating for Alaskan oil. Drilling in Alaska has been a contentious issue since the 1970s, with environmentalists raising a clamor about protecting the national wildlife refuges and the pristine wilderness. Some feared that oil exploration would cause undue harm from oil spills and would disrupt the thriving tourism industry, as well as the centuries-old wildlife migration patterns. However, with the looming energy crisis, the Alaskan pipeline may be the only solution.
“Suddenly people started coming into town,” described JB Carnahan, former police officer in Fairbanks Alaska. “It happened kind of rapidly when it took off. Because I don’t think anybody really believed this monstrous project was going to impact us. I mean, maybe the politicians did, but I think the average guy was just kind of going, ‘Oh sure, we’ve heard this before,’ because this has always been a boom or bust town. And suddenly, there it was.” When the Trans-Alaskan pipeline project began, a flood of people came to town with $3,000 – $5,000 cash burning holes in their pockets, beautiful women arrived from New York and Florida, welders and construction workers drove up from Oklahoma and Texas, South American and Irish immigrants came to collect a check and everyone from secretaries and teachers, to prostitutes and pimps came looking for their fortune. Fairbanks hadn’t seen such activity since the gold rush of the late 1800s! Within a year, the population had doubled in size to 40,000 strong, and the pipeline project had transformed this sleepy two-cop town into a bustling metropolis. Unfortunately, along with all of the business came higher rents, more drugs and more crime.
Over 30 years of operation, the Alaskan pipeline suffered some well-publicized mishaps. In 1977, a pump station exploded, spilling 300 barrels of oil. In 1989, the Exxon Valdez hit the Bligh Reef near Valdez, spilling 11 million gallons of crude into the Prince William Sound harbor. Salmon, birds, whales, sea otters and bald eagles were all casualties of the worst oil spill in U.S. history. In 2001, a man shot a hole in the pipeline, spilling 300,000 gallons of oil. In 2002, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake hurt some of the support structures. Environmentalists charge that there’s a spill a day, but oil experts say this massive pipeline is one of the cleanest in the world.
Many tourists visiting the state of Alaska hope to catch a bird’s eye view of the massive 800-mile Alaskan pipeline, which stretches over purple mountains and blue ice, lit by crimson sunsets or offset by brilliant blue skies, zig-zagging upwards through the yellowed grass or straight-lining across the frozen tundra. Visitors can photograph the pipeline from several marked viewpoints along the Richardson, Steese and Dalton Highways. On the Richardson Highway, you can stop at Milepost V 64.7 (Pump Station 12), Milepost V 216 (Denali Fault), Milepost V 243.5, and the Tanana River Pipeline Crossing at Milepost V 275.4. At the Steese Highway viewing spot, visitors can walk right up to the pipeline or check out an information cabin at the “Trans-Alaska Pipeline Viewpoint,” situated at Milepost F 8.4, just outside Fairbanks Alaska. Along the Dalton Highway, which parallels the pipeline, you can see the structure from the BLM Yukon River Crossing Visitor Contact Station at Milepost J 56, just over two hours from Fairbanks.
By Travel Editor
