Fairway Rock
Encyclopedia
Islet
An islet is a very small island.- Types :As suggested by its origin as islette, an Old French diminutive of "isle", use of the term implies small size, but little attention is given to drawing an upper limit on its applicability....
in the Bering Strait
Bering Strait
The Bering Strait , known to natives as Imakpik, is a sea strait between Cape Dezhnev, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia, the easternmost point of the Asian continent and Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, USA, the westernmost point of the North American continent, with latitude of about 65°40'N,...
, located southeast of the Diomede Islands
Diomede Islands
The Diomede Islands , also known in Russia as Gvozdev Islands , consist of two rocky, tuya-like islands:* The U.S. island of Little Diomede or, in its native language, Ignaluk , and* The Russian island of Big Diomede , also known as Imaqliq,...
and west of Alaska
Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...
's Cape Prince of Wales
Cape Prince of Wales
Cape Prince of Wales is the westernmost point on the mainland of the Americas.Located on the Seward Peninsula of the U.S. state of Alaska near the city of Wales, Cape Prince of Wales is the terminus of the Continental Divide, marking the division between the Pacific and Arctic coasts, as well as...
. It has an area of 0.3 km² (.12 mi², Census block
Census block
A census block is the smallest geographic unit used by the United States Census Bureau for tabulation of 100-percent data . Several blocks make up block groups, which again make up census tracts. There are on average about 39 blocks per block group, but there are variations...
1047, Nome, Alaska). Known to Eskimo
Eskimo
Eskimos or Inuit–Yupik peoples are indigenous peoples who have traditionally inhabited the circumpolar region from eastern Siberia , across Alaska , Canada, and Greenland....
natives of the Bering Strait region in prehistory, Fairway was documented by James Cook
James Cook
Captain James Cook, FRS, RN was a British explorer, navigator and cartographer who ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy...
in 1778 and named by Frederick Beechey in 1826. Although uninhabited, the island is a nesting site for seabirds — most notably the least
Least Auklet
The Least Auklet, Aethia pusilla, is a seabird and the smallest species of auk. It is the most abundant seabird in North America, and one of the most abundant in the world, with a population of around nine million birds. They breed on the islands of Alaska and Siberia, and spend the winter close to...
and crested auklet
Crested Auklet
The Crested Auklet is a small seabird of the family Alcidae which nests in huge colonies in the Bering Sea and Sea of Okhotsk. They often breed in mixed-species colonies with Least Auklets, their smaller congener.The Crested Auklet can measure in length, in wingspan and weigh...
— which prompt egg-collecting visits from local indigenous peoples. The United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
placed radioisotope thermoelectric generator
Radioisotope thermoelectric generator
A radioisotope thermoelectric generator is an electrical generator that obtains its power from radioactive decay. In such a device, the heat released by the decay of a suitable radioactive material is converted into electricity by the Seebeck effect using an array of thermocouples.RTGs can be...
-powered environmental monitoring equipment on the island from the 1960s through the 1990s.
Geography
Diomede Islands
The Diomede Islands , also known in Russia as Gvozdev Islands , consist of two rocky, tuya-like islands:* The U.S. island of Little Diomede or, in its native language, Ignaluk , and* The Russian island of Big Diomede , also known as Imaqliq,...
, is the remnant of an earlier era of glaciation. http://www.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/frameindex.html?http://www.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/writings/cruise_of_the_corwin/chapter_17.html
Fairway Rock is situated 12 mi (19 km) SSE of Little Diomede Island
Diomede Islands
The Diomede Islands , also known in Russia as Gvozdev Islands , consist of two rocky, tuya-like islands:* The U.S. island of Little Diomede or, in its native language, Ignaluk , and* The Russian island of Big Diomede , also known as Imaqliq,...
and 20 mi (32 km) W of Cape Prince of Wales
Cape Prince of Wales
Cape Prince of Wales is the westernmost point on the mainland of the Americas.Located on the Seward Peninsula of the U.S. state of Alaska near the city of Wales, Cape Prince of Wales is the terminus of the Continental Divide, marking the division between the Pacific and Arctic coasts, as well as...
, at 65°37′N 168°44′W. The island is variously reported as from 300 m
to 1.5 km in length.
Rising steeply from the surrounding waters to 534 feet (162.8 m) above sea level, Fairway Rock can be easily seen from the mainland coast of Alaska at Cape Prince of Wales.
Because of its steep cliffs, it poses no additional maritime hazard.
The Bering Strait around Fairway Rock is relatively shallow — about 50 m in depth — and oceanographic transects show the island to lie near a current velocity minimum for the strait.
Ocean currents north of Fairway Rock are occasionally studied as an example of a real-world system where a Von Kármán vortex street
Von Kármán vortex street
A Kármán vortex street is a term in fluid dynamics for a repeating pattern of swirling vortices caused by the unsteady separation of flow of a fluid over bluff bodies...
is generated.
Politically, Fairway Rock is part of the U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
state of Alaska
Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...
and lies inside Alaska's Nome Census Area and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game's Wildlife Conservation Unit 22E. It is conveyed to Inalik Native Corporation. Fairway Rock appears on USGS topographic maps in the Teller Quadrangle.
Flora and fauna
The island supports a breeding colony of about 35,000 seabirds, including some 25,000 Least
Least Auklet
The Least Auklet, Aethia pusilla, is a seabird and the smallest species of auk. It is the most abundant seabird in North America, and one of the most abundant in the world, with a population of around nine million birds. They breed on the islands of Alaska and Siberia, and spend the winter close to...
and Crested Auklet
Crested Auklet
The Crested Auklet is a small seabird of the family Alcidae which nests in huge colonies in the Bering Sea and Sea of Okhotsk. They often breed in mixed-species colonies with Least Auklets, their smaller congener.The Crested Auklet can measure in length, in wingspan and weigh...
s. http://iba.audubon.org/iba/viewSiteProfile.do?siteId=1065&navSite=state In 1925, the Tufted Puffin
Tufted Puffin
The Tufted Puffin also known as Crested Puffin, is a relatively abundant medium-sized pelagic seabird in the auk family found throughout the North Pacific Ocean....
(Fratercula cirrhata), Horned Puffin
Horned Puffin
The Horned Puffin is an auk, similar in appearance to the Atlantic Puffin; this bird's bill is yellow at the base and red at the tip. It is a pelagic seabird that feeds primarily by diving for fish. It nests in colonies, often with other auks.The yellow bill plate grows before the breeding...
(Fratercula corniculata), Parakeet Auklet
Parakeet Auklet
The Parakeet Auklet is a small seabird of the North Pacific. It used to be placed on its own in the genus Cyclorrhynchus but recent morphological and genetic evidence suggest it should be placed in the genus Aethia. It is associated with the boreal waters of Alaska and Kamchatka and Siberia...
s (Aethia psittacula), and Pallas' Murre (Uria lomvia arra) were reported at Fairway Rock, nesting in the crevices of the island's cliffs. http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Condor/files/issues/v027n02/p0062-p0067.pdf A 1960 account reports that Eskimo inhabitants of Little Diomede reported a Glaucous Gull
Glaucous Gull
The Glaucous Gull is a large gull which breeds in the Arctic regions of the northern hemisphere and the Atlantic coasts of Europe. It is migratory, wintering from in the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans as far south as the British Isles and northernmost states of the USA, also on the Great...
(Larus hyperboreus) colony on Fairway Rock larger than that on Little Diomede. http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Condor/files/issues/v062n06/p0457-p0463.pdf
The Steller Sea Lion, an endangered species, may also breed on Fairway Rock. http://www.asgdc.state.ak.us/maps/cplans/nwa/pdfs/ESI_DATA/INTRO.PDF
Discovery and Establishment of Outpost
Fairway Rock was sighted by Captain James CookJames Cook
Captain James Cook, FRS, RN was a British explorer, navigator and cartographer who ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy...
on August 8, 1778. http://www.captaincooksociety.com/ccsu65.htm It was named by the English naval officer and geographer Frederick William Beechey
Frederick William Beechey
Frederick William Beechey was an English naval officer and geographer. He was the son of Sir William Beechey, RA., and was born in London.-Career:...
upon sighting the island in July 1826. Unlike the names he gave to the Diomede Islands
Diomede Islands
The Diomede Islands , also known in Russia as Gvozdev Islands , consist of two rocky, tuya-like islands:* The U.S. island of Little Diomede or, in its native language, Ignaluk , and* The Russian island of Big Diomede , also known as Imaqliq,...
, the name "Fairway" has persisted.
Fairway Rock was passed and mentioned within the accounts of John Muir
John Muir
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, have been read by millions...
's voyage aboard the Corwin
USRC Thomas Corwin (1876)
The Thomas Corwin was a United States Revenue Cutter and subsequently a merchant vessel. These two very different roles both centered on Alaska and the Bering Sea...
in 1881 and Roald Amundsen
Roald Amundsen
Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912 and he was the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is also known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage....
aboard the Gjøa
Gjøa
Gjøa was the first vessel to transit the Northwest Passage. With a crew of six, Roald Amundsen traversed the passage in a three year journey, finishing in 1906.- History :- Construction :...
in 1906.
What is considered the last offensive action of the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
happened in this area: the CSS Shenandoah
CSS Shenandoah
CSS Shenandoah, formerly Sea King, was an iron-framed, teak-planked, full rigged ship, with auxiliary steam power, captained by Commander James Waddell, Confederate States Navy, a North Carolinian with twenty years' service in the United States Navy.During 12½ months of 1864–1865 the ship...
fell upon a fleet of whale
Whale
Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...
rs working the waters near Alaska's Little Diomede Island and sank more than two dozen ships on June 22, 1865. This is chronicled in the book The Last Shot.
In 1964, the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker USCGC Northwind (WAGB-282) visited the Rock, and installed an unmanned oceanographic station in order to measure water flows across the Bering Strait.
The Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
placed a strontium
Strontium
Strontium is a chemical element with the symbol Sr and the atomic number 38. An alkaline earth metal, strontium is a soft silver-white or yellowish metallic element that is highly reactive chemically. The metal turns yellow when exposed to air. It occurs naturally in the minerals celestine and...
-powered radioisotope thermoelectric generator
Radioisotope thermoelectric generator
A radioisotope thermoelectric generator is an electrical generator that obtains its power from radioactive decay. In such a device, the heat released by the decay of a suitable radioactive material is converted into electricity by the Seebeck effect using an array of thermocouples.RTGs can be...
(RTG) atop Fairway Rock for "powering environmental instruments". http://www.csp.navy.mil/asl/Timeline.htm http://www.heritage.org/Research/EnergyandEnvironment/bg48.cfm. At this time Commander John C. LeDoux was in charge of NavFac's shore based nuclear power program, whose over 200 trained men only had one power plant
McMurdo Station
McMurdo Station is a U.S. Antarctic research center located on the southern tip of Ross Island, which is in the New Zealand-claimed Ross Dependency on the shore of McMurdo Sound in Antarctica. It is operated by the United States through the United States Antarctic Program, a branch of the National...
to run. With a new NavFac Chief taking over soon, Commander LeDoux feared the program might be cancelled if it had no other applications. In his memoir LeDoux writes that, "like good marketers we produced a catalog of what was available and sent it to all Navy commands."http://www.amazon.com/dp/1412000793 Within two weeks they received an urgent request for a generator at Fairway Rock.
Fairway Rock's then-current generator was propane fueled and could not operate in the winter months. Since the generator powered "detectors on the ocean floor for submarine traffic heading North"http://www.amazon.com/dp/1412000793 it was considered essential that it be replaced rapidly. However, moving the new generator from Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
to Alaska
Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...
to Fairway Rock would be a complicated process and LeDoux suspected that "red tape"
Red tape
Red tape is excessive regulation or rigid conformity to formal rules that is considered redundant or bureaucratic and hinders or prevents action or decision-making...
would delay the operation for a long time.
Commander LeDoux was able to use contacts in the AEC
United States Atomic Energy Commission
The United States Atomic Energy Commission was an agency of the United States government established after World War II by Congress to foster and control the peace time development of atomic science and technology. President Harry S...
to get approval to move the generator in only 4 days, which he considered "a miracle in itself."http://www.amazon.com/dp/1412000793 A weekly Air Force
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
flight to Vietnam
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
was able to take it to Alaska. Getting the generator onto the island itself proved more difficult, since there were no Navy helicopters in the area. A bush pilot was contracted, two refueling locations were set up by the Army Corps of Engineers
United States Army Corps of Engineers
The United States Army Corps of Engineers is a federal agency and a major Army command made up of some 38,000 civilian and military personnel, making it the world's largest public engineering, design and construction management agency...
, and a Coast Guard
United States Coast Guard
The United States Coast Guard is a branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven U.S. uniformed services. The Coast Guard is a maritime, military, multi-mission service unique among the military branches for having a maritime law enforcement mission and a federal regulatory agency...
escort was assigned, allowing the journey over the Bering Strait
Bering Strait
The Bering Strait , known to natives as Imakpik, is a sea strait between Cape Dezhnev, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia, the easternmost point of the Asian continent and Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, USA, the westernmost point of the North American continent, with latitude of about 65°40'N,...
to be made safely. In the end, the project only took 10 days and "was done with no money or paperwork - mostly phone calls and personal visits." LeDoux was impressed that a project involving so many disparate military and non-military parties could be carried off in such a short span of time.http://www.amazon.com/dp/1412000793
The device, developed by Martin Marietta
Martin Marietta
Martin Marietta Corporation was an American company founded in 1961 through the merger of The Martin Company and American-Marietta Corporation. The combined company became a leader in chemicals, aerospace, and electronics. In 1995, it merged with Lockheed Corporation to form Lockheed Martin. The...
, was the first commercially-developed instrument of its kind deployed for unattended in-field use by the U.S. government. This use was cited in 1978 Congressional hearings on potential uses for nuclear waste. http://books.google.com/books?vid=OCLC04735487&id=fJx75ndIDekC&q=%22Perhaps+the+most+outstanding+demonstration%22&dq=%22Perhaps+the+most+outstanding+demonstration%22&pgis=1 In 1981 two additional RTGs were added. They were all removed from the island in 1995http://www.csp.navy.mil/asl/Timeline.htm by a joint Army/Navy mission by Chinook helicopters from the
U.S. Army's Ft Wainwright near Fairbanks, Alaska [B Co 4-123 AVN, Ft Wainwright, AK currently B Co 1-52 AVN
52nd Aviation Regiment (United States)
The 52nd Aviation Regiment is an aviation regiment of the U.S. Army.-Lineage:Constituted 31 May 1940 in the Regular Army as Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 204th Quartermaster BattalionActivated 10 June 1942 at Compton, California...
]http://www.eldrbarry.net/paulmcqm/web_locker/AboutPaul/navy/salvor.htm
Footnotes
