Squamish's Norm Hann is standing up for what he believes in - literally.
Hann is travelling 300 kilometres along the Northern B.C. Coast on a 14-foot long stand up paddleboard (commonly referred to as SUP) to protest what he fears is the looming destruction of the area's delicate ecosystem.
Hann wants to bring awareness to the potential threat to the Great Bear Rainforest near the Queen Charlottes. A plan to build a new oil pipeline from the Alberta tar sands through the rainforest region and into the coastal town of Kitimat will endanger wildlife and habitat, he said.
"Not a lot of people know what's happening up there and what the threats are, so basically I'll be paddling for the First Nations communities and for the wildlife."
Hann runs Mountain Surf Adventures out of Squamish, but for more than a decade, he's spent much of his time in the Great Bear Rainforest teaching local youth essential work skills through a program at Northwest Community College.
At two million hectares, the Great Bear Rainforest is one of the largest temperate rainforests left in the world, home to thousands of species of plants and animals including killer whales, black bears, grizzly bears and white Kermode bears commonly referred to as spirit bears.
The rainforest stretches from the northern tip of Vancouver Island to southeast Alaska.
Surrounded by the Coast Mountains and located about 620 kilometres north of Squamish, Kitimat sits at the tip of a wide fjord a mere 96 kilometres away from open water, perfect for a deep sea shipping system that would transport Alberta's oil to other parts of the world.
Plans to create shipping lanes for 350-metre long crude oil tanker ships along the northern coast will invariably result in an oil spill, said Hann. And this could damage the ecosystem and ancient food harvesting lands of local First Nations beyond repair.
"If there is a spill - and it's sort of inevitable that a spill will happen - there won't be anything left up there and it's such an incredible area, the Great Bear Rainforest. It's a real magical place."
Hann said the sinking of the Queen of the North BC Ferry near Hartley Bay in 2006, had a profound impact on the local ecology, although practically no oil was spilled.
"They weren't able to harvest the clams for the last three years because they were contaminated," he said.
In comparison, the impact an oil spill would have on the area and its people would be tremendous.
During Hann's 300-kilometre, awareness-raising journey, he intends to update a web blog daily and will try to post videos to document the peoples and the wildlife he encounters.
Nearly three-quarters of Hann's route will follow the proposed tanker route to show what type of environment the crude tankers would be in contact with if the plan goes through as proposed. He also plans to stop at several First Nations seaweed and halibut harvesting areas to document what the area means to the traditional peoples of the land.
"The best case scenario would be to be able to cover a lot of ground quickly, with time left over to document these areas and interview people about why these areas are important and what is at risk if there's oil tankers on the coast."
Since his clothing is sponsored by First Ascent, and Surftech sponsored his board, this trip isn't costing Hann much other than the two weeks he taking off work. Hann is not accepting any donations however individuals wishing to donate to protect Great Bear Rainforest can do so at Pacificwild.org, an organization dedicated to preserving Pacific Coast wildlife and its habitat.
Hann plans to launch on his 14-day expedition Monday May 3 from Kitimat and head straight into Great Bear Rainforest before turning south to Bella Bella.
And since his method of transport is a relatively new sport, he can also be credited with a accomplishing such a trek for the first time.
"I thought this would be a neat thing to do, you know to paddle that route and see it at that speed," he said. "Technically [stand up paddleboarding is] a little bit tougher and no-one's quite done it yet, so it's good to promote the sport as well."
For more information on Hann's expedition visit www.mountainsurfadventures.com and click on StandUp4GreatBear.
