Arctic grit, ingenuity saves lost Atqasuk woman from tragedy

[Alaska]

What an awesome story! And from my area!

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Published on November 5th, 2009
Arctic grit, ingenuity saves lost Atqasuk woman from tragedy

By Becky Crabtree
Wanda Kippi, secretary at Meade River School in Atqasuk, mother of eight, and, most importantly, a hunter and expert in the Arctic outdoors, sat in her living room last Sunday afternoon with her frostbitten feet up, gazing out across the streets of her home village. She expressed her gratitude to all who had searched for her and supported her family, then told the tale of two weeks before, when the village had mobilized to search and pray for her as she survived for six days on the tundra trying to get home.
Kippi had gone out on her four-wheeler for a day trip to hunt caribou. She left early on the morning of Saturday, Oct. 3, while her older daughters were still sleeping. Before she left, she hugged and kissed her youngest three children and her infant granddaughter and told them "I will be home soon." These words would be foremost in her thoughts over the next few days.
Kippi traveled to Qalluuraq where her family has a cabin and where her mother, brother, niece and nephew were fishing and hunting during the unseasonably warm fall weather. This was not new territory for her, as she had made the same trip hundreds of times, almost every weekend and even after work some evenings. On the way out to the cabin, at the halfway point, she spoke with another hunter, Jimmy Nayukok, and waited and watched for caribou which never came; then she headed on to the cabin and left some homework for her young relatives. She climbed a mound and stood on an overturned five-gallon bucket and scanned the tundra for caribou through binoculars. Next she went nearby to the "high hill," Nuisugnaaq, and watched and waited over two hours. Seeing no sign of caribou, she made the first decision which would endanger her life. In spite of changing weather in the form of drizzly, blowing snow, she took off on her Honda, pulling a sled, looking for caribou.
She thought she had driven only a mile or two when she turned and went the opposite direction back to the cabin. Her handheld GPS worked enough to align the satellites and then it kept shutting off, only powered enough for her to get compass directions. Perhaps the batteries were cold. At any rate, she thought she had overshot the cabin and turned back the other way. Then she noticed through the blowing snow that she had passed the same round metal pole going both south and north and realized that she had gone too far.
Adding to her problems, Kippi had lost a contact lens in the wind and her nearsighted condition worked against her as she continued to hunt caribou and to find her way back to the cabin. She had seen a small herd of caribou and shot once but couldn't see if an animal fell. Now, nearsighted in one eye and wishing to conserve her bullets, she gave up on hunting.
She drove onward, changing directions and searching for landmarks. By dark, she was looking for a place to sleep. She used her sled and tarp and bungee cords to fashion a shelter out of the wind, cleaned and collected lake ice in a Ziploc bag and settled down in her makeshift shelter. She prayed before she went to sleep and asked not to be taken from her children. She also prayed that she be watched over and that animals within a mile of her be kept away. She was scared, but slept pretty well the first night. By the time she awakened, her daughters in Atqasuk had called Search and Rescue, and ground crews were beginning to look for her.
On Sunday morning the weather had cleared a bit, but visibility was still limited. She saw some drums and thought she was near Atqasuk, but they were not the drums she knew. After crossing a lake, she noted that the terrain got rougher and she hit a bump and flew off the Honda and landed hard. She rolled over fast and put out her arm to guard against the sled sliding over her, but it had stopped. The jolt knocked the wind out of her and left her side hurting. She had her rifle on her back, a Winchester .243 that her father had bought for her; it had stuck in the ground, and the barrel was stuffed with snow and ice. Her gas gauge showed little fuel and the Honda was stalling out, so she looked for a high hill to give her protection from the wind.
At 1:15 Sunday afternoon, Kippi sputtered to a stop and maneuvered her sled and four-wheeler in place to keep her out of the wind. Using a big knife, she cut willows and placed them on her sled, covered them with her extra parka, then more willows, then a plastic bag for her bed. She rigged the tarp to cover her head, crawled in, prayed again and went to sleep, a little less scared than she had been the first night. Somehow, her confidence grew after making it through the first day and she felt more at peace.
When she opened the tarp with the dawn on Monday morning, she thought, "All right, today I will be found!" After eating some crackers and one of her two candy bars she cut more willows to build a fire. The tissues and the candy wrapper were not enough to start a fire, so Kippi used part of an extra quart of oil to coat the willows to burn. As she was bending over stacking the willows, she heard a plane. It was less than 100 yards ahead of her. She was so happy! She climbed up on her Honda and waved her arms at the plane, but they didn't see her.
It broke Kippi's heart when she realized that they were not going to find her. She knew the way to go because the weather was clear, she had the GPS compass directions and she could see the direction the plane was flying. She used a marker to write on her wooden sled: "Mon. October ___ walking home, Look (and a directional arrow)". Quickly, she packed the supplies that she could carry: a rifle, a tarp, knives, binoculars, plastic bags, two tiny first aid kits, all her snacks and her backpack. She had made another important decision; she set off walking. It was hard for her to leave the four-wheeler and she kept turning to check its position until it was out of sight.
For the next four days Kippi walked. She thought of her children. She prayed for strength. Her feet and legs got wet the first day when the ice on a creek broke and she fell in above her knees. She rolled over, pulled herself up and kept walking. She dried both socks from her right foot with a lighter as she rested that night but she went to sleep before she could dry the socks from the left side. She slept on the ground, smelled the freshness of the tundra and was amazed at the colors of fall so close up - oranges, reds, yellows, and even greens so late in the season. She watched snowy owls pop up and glide above a creek and heard a raven "gawk, gawk" at her. She heard a bird whistle and realized that there were no birds. A fat albino lemming walked right in front of her. She saw fox tracks everywhere and wolf tracks going in the opposite direction. She walked every day until it was too dark, then rested for the next day's trek. She saw the stars through the clouds and recognized two constellations: Cassopeia and the Three Wise Men.
On Tuesday, she watched the rescue plane fly back and forth in front of her and the chopper fly behind her. Then one flew to her right and the other to her left. They were all around her and didn't see her. She saw the headlights of two four-wheelers coming toward her and then watched them turn and disappear. Her excitement turned to anger as she realized that she had wasted a whole afternoon and evening trying to get their attention when she could have been walking. She cleaned her gun with a wooden Q-tip from the first aid kit. She took one Advil of the two-pack, also from the first aid kit, both the first and second nights, which helped her cramping muscles.
She had heard that eating snow would dehydrate her so she took her gloves off to clean lake ice and chip off pieces that she carried to melt in her mouth. Once she caught rapidly flowing water from a stream in her plastic bag and drank it all. She learned that the best way to quench her thirst was eating cranberries. The last evening, she lay on her stomach and ate all the berries she saw. As the days went on, it took less and less to fill her up.
Meanwhile, ground crews from Atqasuk, Barrow, and Wainwright were searching for her. Both a rescue "bird" and a helicopter from Barrow flew sortie after sortie. North Slope Borough pilot Jess McCoy, who coordinated the rescue effort from Barrow, estimated that ground crews spent over 1,600 hours searching and the air search went on for about 250 hours. Twenty-seven volunteers combed the tundra by land, eight spotters flew alongside flight crews searching by air. Community members cooked food and delivered it to searchers. Prayers continued. A frazzled Meade River School staff met daily to share news and to try to maintain normalcy for worried students and colleagues. Dora "Alu" Brower, the godmother of the Kippi children, arrived in Atqasuk with groceries and her perpetual smile and moved in to help the family while they waited. E-mails of support came from across the slope. Telephones and VHF radios buzzed with activity while residents of three villages listened for news.

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[Alaska]

Winds on Wednesday night gusted to over 40 miles per hour and wind chills dropped to 5 degrees. Kippi was tired, surprised that her legs still felt good, but worried about her sore, aching feet. For the first time, she stopped walking during the day, put her backpack and rifle on either side of her and rested. She fell asleep and woke in the dark and the wind. That night she got a sandy bag of ice from the river and made her way around the bend to a cabin that she knew, the Nashugnik cabin, and found shelter there. She remembers that night as being the longest of her life. It was cold, she wanted to walk to keep her feet warm, but was so tired that she staggered from wall to wall. She waited and waited for daylight. How she wished that the candy wrappers and empty soda cans left in the cabin were full!

At first light, she began walking again, following a familiar path to Pikigruak Creek. After a cautious crossing, she got up on the bank, got on her knees and put her hands together and prayed, "Lord, please let them find me today." Then she kept on walking. She saw a ridge ahead that looked square, at least to her one good eye. She realized that it was a Honda, actually four Hondas and they were going past her. She quickly gathered her senses and managed to shoot off all five shots she had. She cried out, "Let them find me!"

She saw Atqasuk's volunteer searchers "Jack Jack" Ahkivigak first and next TJ Tazruk both grinning from cheek to cheek. Then, Abraham Itta and Jack Tazruk pulled up. They offered her a sandwich and she didn't want one, but she said that she could use something to drink. She opened a Coca-Cola that promptly exploded all over her glove. She didn't care. She finished two sodas as they gave directions to the chopper and waited for her to be picked up.

The six-day adventure ended with a quick chopper ride home, an emotional reunion with family and then several days in Barrow for medical supervision.

Barrow's Jess McCoy and Kippi agree that her dark clothing kept her from being seen from the air. McCoy encourages hunters (who usually wear camouflaged clothing) to pack a bright orange garment and a small mirror for signaling in case they need it. He promotes the use of Personal Locator Beacons (PLBs), even for short trips, and noted that they are free and available in every village. Finally, McCoy reports that plastic orange distress signs have been ordered for distribution. They are about three feet square, have rivets in the corners to be staked in the ground, and can be seen in any terrain from 10,000 feet.

Kippi was located about two miles from her family's cabin at Qalluuraq. She suspects she walked about 30 miles; some think it was over 40. She admits that she wasn't ready and doubts if one can ever be completely prepared in a situation like that. She confesses that she has been changed, that she sees life around her more fully and is aware that her story could have ended very differently if the temperatures had been lower. "My dad taught me how to hunt - I hope that my sons and daughters who have gone out hunting with me have gained the same knowledge."

McCoy, who has spent many years working in search and rescue on the North Slope, said that other than a summer afternoon hiker missing for a few hours, no other Barrow rescue mission in recent years has targeted a missing woman. Few searches of this length have had such a happy ending. Kippi credits her children for giving her the hope to keep trying. With tears in her eyes, she explains that they were precious to her before, but her time alone on the tundra has only magnified her love. Her ingenuity and survival skills showcase the remarkable attributes of a true arctic woman.

Becky Crabtree is the principal of Meade River School in Atqasuk and author of the book "Alaska Hoops: Coaching Tips and Tales from the Girls' Locker Room."

Contact us about this article at editor@thearcticsounder.com

[carousel eyes]

Wow! What a brave and optimistic woman! So glad she's okay.

[everything posh]

I'm so glad she was found and is ok!