In the Wake of the Corpse Whale Biologists are discovering that
commercial fishing and global warming imperil the narwhal's
frozen corner of the globe IT IS 2 A.M. on a mid-August night,
but the sun still hangs on the horizon, and the temperature
hovers in the 30s. Two biologists are standing watch on the
rocky shoreline of Creswell Bay on Somerset Island in the
eastern Canadian High Arctic. Suddenly the dorsal ridge of a
narwhal, a small Arctic whale, surfaces in the bay and advances
toward a net the scientists have stretched 150 feet out from
shore. When the narwhal barrels into the net, the biologists
sound the alarm. Instantly, everyone in the nearby research camp
clambers out of tents, dons orange survival suits and rushes to
launch Zodiacs for a race to the entrapped whale. Soon, two
boats circle the spot where the narwhal struggles underwater.
The crews grab the net with thickly gloved hands and begin
pulling the flailing 2,600-pound male to the surface, avoiding
the long, slender tusk protruding from