Killing Keiko (6 page)

Eventually this signature landing style would become comfortable, and I would boast
that Icelandic pilots must be the best pilots in the world. But for this once, it
left my knees knocking and concluded an adrenaline-packed welcome to Vestmannaeyjar
that was more apropos than I would yet realize.

Robin met me at the small island airport, and we embarked on a driving tour of Heimaey.
The island was fascinating: in many ways seemingly inhospitable, but also beautifully
quaint. For someone who (at the time) had not traveled the world, it was certainly
an interesting place to cut my teeth. My first inclination was to believe that I had
walked right onto the pages of a
National Geographic
pictorial, which after all, wasn’t entirely unlikely. It had every element of the
old world feel complete with “rugged ole” fishing vessels and “rugged ole” fishermen.

Much like Keflavik, Heimaey had no trees to speak of; there were the occasional saplings
planted on the leeward side of individual homes and that was it. The houses and buildings
were mostly white with colorful tin roofs of red, white or blue, huddled together
as if to shield each other from the pounding winds that made Heimaey their playground.
It took a mere glance on aerial approach to discern the island’s most valued attribute,
its protected harbor, from which the town of densely packed buildings and homes radiated
outward. Houses appeared more like shelters disguised as homes. Their stalwart construction
put the Three Little Pigs’ handiwork to shame.

Icelanders that call Heimaey their home are proud of the island’s many Viking charms.
Among them it boasts the highest recorded winds of any populated area in Iceland.
A remote weather station on the southernmost extent of the island had routinely, and
I stress “routinely,” documented sustained winds of more than 140 miles per hour;
the most notable records cataloging speeds in excess of 200 miles per hour.

The heart of downtown consisted of a couple of cross streets lined with small shops,
a geodesic-shaped grocery store and various multipurpose office buildings. Of course
the majority of the town’s economy was centered on fisheries. This was a niche community
of nearly 5,000 Icelanders that was, by short description, a remote fishing village
(or a drinking village with a fishing problem). Almost fifteen percent of Iceland’s
fishing exports came from this small town on Heimaey. It was a lifestyle and culture
that
would in ways provide both advantage and menace to the Keiko project down the road.

The sometimes extreme elements of the far North were not the only adversary that lent
to the island’s rich character. Vestmannaeyjar is the home of two notorious volcanoes,
Helgafel and Eldfel. Both seem to tower over the small island town with an ageless
indifference, yet no rational islander feels any indifference toward them. In 1973
Eldfel erupted and after blowing off steam for five months left the landscape forever
changed. There is no shortage of locals in the Westman Islands who remember this event
firsthand. Over the following many months I spent in Vestmannaeyjar, I would hear
harrowing tales of the violent eruption. The lava that erupted from Eldfel covered
parts of the town and increased the island’s mass by nearly one fifth. Still, Vestmannaeyjar
overflowed with an otherworldly charisma, not exactly what one would expect in a place
called Iceland.

Part of the island created by the eruption in 1973 now serves as an overlook from
the mouth of the island’s harbor. At the end of the short tour, Robin took us to the
overlook to see the operation from a more full view and to briefly spend time alone
before meeting the staff. From here I could look directly north and see the bay pen,
the base of operations and Keiko’s temporary Icelandic home. In order to step out
on the overlook, I had to open the car door for the first time since arriving, which
was promptly ripped from my grasp by the winds funneling across the elevated observation
point.
Stupendous
, I thought, not forty-five minutes on the island and I had already made my “mark”
on the project. The door of that truck would never work smoothly again, popping and
resisting each time it was opened or closed.
Nice
, I thought.
I’m sure that will gain favor
. Besides the wind, the weather was impressively mild, about twenty-eight degrees
Fahrenheit; not the frigid biting cold anticipated this close to the Arctic Circle.
The overlook appeared more like a flat spot amidst the volcanic rock than any tourist
vista, remiss of any visitor amenities. We were the only patrons of its unearthly
view that afternoon.

Waves crashing against the cliffs to the east of the overlook immediately commanded
my attention. Despite the fact that the rise is well above sea level, there were geysers
of saltwater being thrown high in the air above the edge of the drop-off; striking
literally and figuratively. Opposite the overlook, the bay pen was nestled in a U-shaped
bay just inside the mouth of a long, somewhat narrow channel. This was the entry channel
to the well-protected harbor at the heart of the town.

The bay itself was surrounded on three sides by cliffs that shot angrily straight
up from the water and towered hundreds of feet over the bay. My first thought was
about noise. I had seen a multitude of large ships and boats moored in the harbor
on our drive through town. It was surprising to me that the bay pen was situated so
close to the shipping channel. Marine mammals have very sensitive hearing and can
hear sounds across a much broader range of the frequency scale than human ears can
appreciate. In marine mammal circles, it’s often said that they “live in a world of
sound.” The position of the bay pen placed it right in what appeared like a giant
parabolic echo chamber.
Surely the shipping traffic noise had to be detrimental to Keiko?
Overloaded with sensory input of the surroundings myself, I quickly became distracted
with the bay pen, the bull’s-eye of Klettsvik Bay.

The structure was quite simple and from my vantage point on the overlook, appeared
incredibly small. It wasn’t small, but relative to the cliffs, the massive bay and
the mouth of the channel, it looked like an oddly appointed fish hatchery about the
size of a tennis court. In actuality, the bay pen was almost the length of a football
field and nearly seventy feet wide. The configuration was that of two octagonal circles
joined by a smaller square pool in between. It did not narrow in the midsection; rather
this is where the bulk of the deck space existed surrounding the small joining medical
pool (or “med pool”). I could see two boxcar-looking structures placed opposite one
another across the med pool. They looked as if they were balancing the bay pen from
side to side. The pen’s length was situated north to south in the bay, exposing the
south circle to
the shipping channel. I could not make out a killer whale in the pen. I shouldn’t
have expected to, the light was fading and we were roughly half a mile away.

Over the last week, Robin had been engaged in ongoing discussions regarding our involvement
in the project. He was at an impasse. On the overlook, looking out at the bay pen
and shouting through the wind and crashing waves, he shared with me the primary roadblocks
to our proposal.

“They don’t believe that behavior has anything to do with the reintroduction,” Robin
started.

I was stunned. “I’m not sure I understand. What do you mean that behavior has nothing
to do with it?”

“It’s the level of ignorance running the project; they don’t have the tools to understand
what to do next or how to prepare Keiko. To some degree, and what I don’t know, they
thought Keiko, once in Iceland, would show them the way. I think the only way to enlighten
them is to slowly introduce them to what is needed for Keiko and explain the process
in simple terms. But we’re going to have to keep it simple … even Jeff doesn’t consider
behavior a part of it.”

Jeff Foster, lead project manager, had a degree in psychology and a background in
collecting wild killer whales, but he had never been involved in their training beyond
that of initial acclimation. I didn’t even know how to respond to Robin’s comment.

“Then why am I here? I mean, why did they agree to fly me up here?”

“Because I insisted.”

“Great, so I’m the black sheep that no one wants here or agrees with? Nice first impressions.”

“We’ll be fine.”

“What’s the plan?” I asked. Both of us had turned our backs to the wind, shoulders
hunched up around our necks and hands shoved in our pants pockets. Robin’s jacket
hood had flipped up over his head. He peered around it as he continued.

“We’ll meet with Jeff and Jen this afternoon and then get out to the bay pen tomorrow
morning.” Jen Schorr was Jeff’s right-hand and the lead organizer for research data
collection. “Charles Vinick is the Ocean Futures executive vice president and the
Keiko Release Project’s chief operations officer. He’s arriving Tuesday, and we’ll
spend more time then or Wednesday going over the proposal and behavioral strategy.”

I looked out over the bay. This was not exactly what I had envisioned.

“That’s almost a week! What happens now? I mean we haven’t come to an agreement or
been hired, right?” The wind was modulating and had dropped at that instant. I was
still shouting, and the sudden overcompensation sounded like an outburst. Given my
sinking stomach, maybe in part, it was.

“No, but I’m pretty sure they want us onboard. The issue is going to be how they hire
us. From my conversations with Charles on the phone, they don’t want our company;
they want us to work for Ocean Futures directly.”

“Does anyone on-site know that we’re here representing our company?”

“I think Jeff does and Peter might, but only because I know Jeff received the proposal.
I don’t know if Peter or anyone else knows. In fact, I don’t think the rest of the
staff has any idea why we’re here.”

After Dr. Cornell had specifically contacted Robin about the project and following
his first tour and evaluation, we had sent a formal proposal on our company letterhead.
The proposal created an awkward conundrum between us and OFS leads. Lanny had intended
to hire a person, not a company. To them, it must have seemed we were trying to take
over the project and their jobs.

I was wearing a denim long-sleeve shirt with our company logo over the left breast
pocket. “What about this?” indicating my shirt, “should I cover it up? You think it’ll
confuse matters?”

“No, it’s fine. Jeff knows why we’re here, and I haven’t tried to hide it with any
of the staff.”

We had noticed the ferry heading into the channel as we talked. It was now passing
right between us and our line of sight to the bay pen. This was no small ferry; it
seemed more of a full-on ship to me. Again I wondered about the noise. Not wanting
to get off track, I checked the thought, convinced that I’d remember to ask about
it later.

“I haven’t really worked Keiko, just observed, and that’s all I’ve really told the
staff … that I’m here to observe the operation and help where I can,” Robin said.

“So in the time you’ve been here and working Keiko, they haven’t asked who you are
or what you’re doing here?” I pressed, completely dumbfounded.

As Robin explained, I learned that no one in upper management had communicated to
those in Heimaey who we were or why we were brought to Iceland. For weeks we had been
toiling with the makeup of our proposal, Dave and I in Florida, and Robin dissecting
operations in Iceland. As a result, here I was now in Iceland and expecting my arrival
and purpose were common knowledge. I didn’t understand why the whole of it seemed
so secretive. To me, it was simple. As the wave of realization came over me, I felt
suddenly awkward. At best, I was an unknown and unwelcome visitor nosing in on their
territory, and they had no idea why.

“So what do you want me to do until Tuesday?”

“You need to focus on Keiko. I want you to get a good read on him before we meet Charles.
We’ll go out to the bay pen with the opening crew tomorrow. We’ll both spend the day
on the pen and watch sessions. I’ve got some additional ideas to add to the proposal
before Charles gets here. You’re not going to believe it, it’s pretty amazing, but
the way they treat Keiko … it’s like he’s a big pet.” The analogy was not the first
of its kind I had heard, but used in this context to describe the release of a long-term
captive whale, it was as chilling as the cutting wind.

So as not to be gone too long, Robin wanted to get back to the hostel, the living
quarters for the frontline staff. Besides, we were both starting to force our words
through clenched and chattering
teeth. “Let’s head back and put your stuff in the hostel, then I’ll introduce you
to Jeff and Jen.”

The hostel was far from the bare-bones travel stops I had heard existed throughout
Europe. This hostel was amazing. They had somehow leased a dormitory-like building
from the local fire department. It had an entry foyer with a couch and a couple well-worn
but welcoming chairs, a full kitchen, men’s and women’s bathrooms with multiple showers
in each, several dorm-style bedrooms, and an enormous common area reminiscent of a
small gymnasium with a pool table in the center. Near the far end and close to the
kitchen was a dinner table fit for twelve with a white dry-erase board mounted on
the wall right behind it.

There was a Partridge Family-meets-NASA feel about the place, warm in some ways, technical
and clinical in others. Camera and recording equipment dominated another large table,
and the entire front wall of the common area was covered by winter gear from parkas
to fleece undergarments and even the occasional dry suit for diving in frigid waters.
Most of the space against the wall was packed with Mustang survival suits—bright orange
full-body survival suits that made the inhabitant look like the Pillsbury Doughboy
no matter how thin the person wearing it. The suits were not much smaller hanging
on the rack.