MELDING WESTERN AND ALEUT SCIENC

MELDING WESTERN AND ALEUT SCIENCE TO UNDERSTAND POSSIBLE RADIATION RISK TO MARINE ANIMALS AT AMCHITKA

Amchitka Island

It was nearly a century ago that the last Aleuts left Amchitka Island, leaving behind years of occupation and a lone cemetery on a hill overlooking a pristine bay. Amchitka Island, part of the Rat Island group, is in the western Aleutians. No one lives there now; the closest Aleut village is at Adak, some 140 miles from Amchitka. When the native community departed long ago, Amchitka was left to nesting birds and Sea Lion rookeries until World War II when the U.S. Government built a military base. Then in the 1960's the Atomic Energy Commission (which later became the Department of Energy) decided to conduct three underground nuclear tests there, over the objections of the Aleut people, the State of Alaska, and even other countries. After the tests, Amchitka Island reverted to being part of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, but the Department of Energy (DOE) retained responsibility for the nuclear contamination they left behind underground. In the late 1990s, the DOE wanted to clean up the surface debris and terminate its responsibility for Amchitka. Still the Aleuts, A/PIA, the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC), and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS) worried that some radiation remained in the marine environment, and that some of the subsistence foods and other animals living there might be contaminated with radionuclides from these tests. Since the Aleutians have much volcanic activity, and some of the strongest earthquakes in the world occur nearby, it was reasonable to wonder whether the underground cavities might be disrupted, allowing radiation to escape. These groups didn't want the DOE to leave without determining if the marine plants and animals were contaminated, and without knowing if the subsistence foods were safe to eat. They expected the DOE to develop a long-term monitoring program so that future generations could be reassured and protected from radiation.

A Path Forward

After a series of meeting, DOE agreed to partly fund a Science Plan developed by an independent university group to study the geophysical and biology of the marine organisms living around Amchitka. The university group names was the Consortium for Risk Evaluation with Stakeholder Participation (CRESP, led by C. W. Powers). The agreement was between A/PIA, ADEC, USFWS and DOE. The main focus of the plan was to establish that the subsistence foods and commercial fish living around Amchitka were safe from radiation, and to gather geophysical and biological data to develop a long-term stewardship plan for Amchitka that included monitoring radiation levels in subsistence foods and other plants and animals.

Answering the question - Are the subsistence foods safe from radionuclides? - was always a key question for the study. But CRESP also wanted to find out if organisms at different points on the food chain were contaminated with radioactivity, and to figure out which kelp and organisms should be used in the future to monitor any possible radiation seepage from the underground tests.

Collaborating with Aleut Communities to Collect Information on Radionuclides

After the Science Plan was accepted, Drs. Joanna Burger and Michael Gochfeld (CRESP) and Robert Patrick (A/PIA) visited Unalaska, Nikolski, and Atka (and later Adak) to talk with the Unangan people about the plan, and to ask for advice about subsistence species of interest, subsistence collecting methods, and how to conduct the study. The native communities have their own scientific understanding of the marine environment, and subsistence hunting and fishing requires them to develop and test hypotheses about where to find their foods and how to secure them. Many changes in the plan were made after talking with the Aleut scientists, including the addition of some subsistence foods and the addition of Aleut fishermen/hunters to the collecting expedition.

The Expedition

In June and July of 2004, CRESP conducted an expedition to Amchitka Island to collect many organisms from the marine ecosystem at all levels on the food chain, including algae, sea urchins, mussels, octopus, and many kinds of fish and seabirds. Our biological group included a logistics manager (D. Volz), 4 diver-scientists from the University of Alaska at Fairbanks (led by Steve Jewett), 4 biologists from Rutgers University (led by Joanna Burger), and 4 people from A/PIA (led by Robert Patrick), including Ronald and Dan Snigaroff and Tim Stamm. Everyone worked side by side, the university scientists using their methods to collect organisms, and the Aleuts using traditional hunting and fishing methods. We kept careful track of who collected each specimen, and exactly where it came from. We came back with about 4,500 pounds of samples.

The knowledge of the Western and Aleut scientists was melded to collect plants and animals that included Aleut subsistence foods and commercial fish species, at all levels of the food chain. The traditional knowledge of the Aleuts on the expedition was essential to the safe collecting of a wide range of species; their knowledge of when and where to find fish and seabirds was impressive.

While on the expedition, Ron and Dan conducted a subsistence hunt for a Sea Lion. They provided the Museum and UAF with samples of muscle and liver, and requested that the Museum have them analyzed for radionuclides since the Sea Lion came from Amchitka Island. The Museum in turn asked CRESP to conduct these along with the other samples.

The Foods are Currently Safe

Once back in the laboratory, we analyzed samples. We conducted analyses of radionuclides in 4 species of kelp, Sea Lettuce, Sea Urchins, Rock Jingles, 2 kinds of Mussels, Octopus, a dozen species of fish, Common Eider, Eagle, Tufted Puffin, Pigeon Guillemot, and Sea Lion. The fish we analyzed included Halibut, Pacific Cod, Rock Greenling, Black Rockfish, Dusky Rockfish, and Pollock, among others. Each sample normally included 5 individuals to increase the number of individuals examined. We analyzed these organisms for several radionuclides that are of a human health concern. These included radiocesium, strontium, and iodine. We also analyzed the kelp and animals for other radionuclides that are natural (such as uranium) and that are a result of nuclear accidents or testing (plutonium, americium).

In all cases, the levels of radionuclides were very low, both when compared to levels found in other parts of the world, and when compared to any human health guidelines. The subsistence foods we tested from Amchitka are safe to eat.

In October of 2005, Joanna, Mike and Bob again visited Unalaska, Nikolski and Atka to report the results, and to thank them for their participation in the collaborative effort to understand the potential for radionuclide exposure from the underground nuclear test shots at Amchitka.

What About the Future?

We looked at the safety of subsistence and commercial foods we collected in 2004. There currently is no cause for concern. However, even the DOE believes that the radionuclides may someday seep into the marine environment. The only question is When, and Where. If they seep out far out into the ocean, then they will become diluted and may not pose a problem. If, however, they seep out near shore, then there is a wide range of organisms living in the marine environment around Amchitka. These could be exposed, and could someday pose a health hazard to people, as well as a health hazard to the animals that live there, like Eagles, Puffins and Sea Lions.

The only way to ensure that the foods continue to be safe is to monitor the radionuclides in them at regular intervals. This is called biomonitoring, and it is important to continue to do this. One of the things we discovered when we analyzed the radionuclides was that some (such as plutonium) was present in kelp and rock jingles, but not in fish and birds. Cesium, on the other hand, was found in animals that are at the top of the food chain, such as Sea Lion, Halibut, Pacific Cod and Octopus. This means that a biomonitoring plan for the future needs to include both ends of the food chain: the bottom (kelp) and the top (Sea Lion, Halibut, Pacific Cod, and other predatory fish).

While the underground contamination cannot be cleaned up because it is so far below the ground, it is important to have early warning if there is any seepage. Early warning would allow for a temporary closure of subsistence hunting and fishing in the areas around Amchitka to prevent exposure. The Unangan peoples have lived in the Aleutians for over 9000 years. It is critical to provide them with the information they need to make informed decisions about their subsistence foods. Further, commercial fishermen from Atka sometimes fish in Amchitka Pass for their catch. While no one lives within 150 miles of Amchitka now, they could visit in the future, and would need to be confident that the foods they harvest remain safe.

For more information, the whole Amchitka Report can be found on the CRESP website, at http://www.cresp.org