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The AIH Transcript for September 04, 2020

Hosts: Helen Mann and Chris Howden

HELEN MANN: Hello, I’m Helen Mann, sitting in for Carol Off.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening, I’m Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

Prologue

CH: Tonight:

HM: Sense of direction. A Quebec dad's frustration at the lack of official coronavirus data was off the charts. So he decided to take matters into his own hands — by mapping COPVID-19 cases in schools.

CH: First light. We hear from an Alaskan woman who sprang into action when a medevac plane picking up a child was struggling to land on an unlit runway. She tells us how she kept her head — and used her headlights.

HM: A journalist covering a land dispute in Ontario was arrested this week, and told not to return. Now Karl Dockstader says he's struggling with whether or not to go back to the 'Land Back' camp.

CH: Falling flat. It turns out no amount of mask wearing and hand washing will protect you from ... yourself. Thus, the tale of the two flat earthers who tried to sail to the end of the world and ended up quarantined in Italy.

HM: Size matters. We knew it was the biggest shark, but now researchers have determined just how big the megalodon actually was. And the answer even surprised the scientists involved.

CH: And... Hit machine. A British man tells us what it's like to live in a house that's been struck by passing trucks as many as twenty times — eight this year alone.

CH: “As It Happens”, the Friday edition. Radio that suspects the eighth time's the harm.

Part one: Quebec COVID schools, Caledonia Journalist Arrest, Wingham trucks into cottage

Quebec COVID schools

Guest: Olivier Drouin

CH: There are always back-to-school jitters. But COVID-19 is making them exponentially worse. Some provinces just wrapped up their first week of school. And in Quebec, parents have been looking for up-to-date information on possible coronavirus cases that might affect their kids. Information that isn't readily available. But today, the Quebec government said it will begin publishing data about confirmed COVID-19 cases at schools. That decision may have been influenced by the actions of Olivier Drouin. Mr. Drouin is a Montreal father. He's launched an online map, tracking COVID-19 cases at schools across the province. Less than a week since he launched it, the website has already had hundreds of thousands of page views. We reached Olivier Drouin in Montreal.

HM: Mr. Drouin, let's start, first of all, with why you began this project? Why did you want to take this on personally?

OLIVIER DROUIN: Personally, I'm actually a dad of two beautiful teenaged girls, and I was worried as every parent was in Quebec, during the pandemic for the back-to-school. And when I saw in May that outside of Montreal, the schools were open, there was actually no data available on the number of cases, even though the government was claiming it was a huge success. So as a parent in Montreal, I had to put my kids back to school last week on the 26. And this idea came to mind where I would actually use technology to list this information to myself and to all other parents that would want to see it.

HM: So you did this because the government's information was not available. Now, the Quebec government is saying it will publish a list of schools with at least one COVID-19 case. How do you feel about this news?

OD: Well, I think it's a step in definitely the right direction. But I listened to the minister's press conference at 1:00 p.m., and he mentioned that his list was going to have about 20 schools and mine has 59 at this point. So there's a huge discrepancy.

HM: What do you think might account for the discrepancy in the data between what they have posted and what you're finding?

OD: Timing. [chuckling] I get the information in real-time from parents and teachers, and I publish it. And they probably have a delay.

HM: You think they're getting theirs from health authorities, something like that?

OD: Yeah, I think they are. And by the time that they get the information, it's probably two, three, four or five days old. I get it in real-time. I get it as soon as a parent receives a letter from the government confirming a case, I publish it on the website.

HM: All right. So let's dig into your data. You say you're getting it from parents and families who are reporting these things to you. How do they get the information to you?

OD: They actually go to my website, which is www.covidecolesquebec.org. And there is a submission form that they fill out with the name of the school, school board, number of children and/or teachers impacted with a positive case. And as soon as they submit, I actually get an email, and I contact them back to ask them for a copy of the letter that the school has issued to confirm that. Because it is mandatory in Quebec for every school that has at least one case to publish a public health letter to all parents of the school, so it's easy for me to fact check and confirm the cases.

HM: So you see that letter as verification that this is an authentic case?

OD: Correct. And I post that letter as a proof on the website as well.

HM: And do you post the number of cases in each school?

OD: No, because that information is not public. So the only thing I have is the number of schools.

HM: If you had more than one parent reporting from one school, would you somehow modify the information?

OD: No, because it would be pure speculation because they could be also reporting the same case. So as long as I have one case in one school, I don't update it anymore. Otherwise, I would be just speculating.

HM: What is your understanding as to why the Quebec government hasn't been posting this information until now itself?

OD: My assumption or hypothesis is that it's a problem of accountability. So you have education, which governs school, and you have public health, which governs the coronavirus outbreak. I have a feeling that the government machine is maybe less efficient to report on those types of information.

HM: Do you have any concern that you might be making parents unnecessarily frightened if they're dealing with just a minor case in one school?

OD: Actually, an outbreak at definition is two-plus cases. So I have many examples of two-plus cases. And no, I'm in contact with at least five to six-thousand parents in Quebec through different Facebook groups. And the reception of the site is extremely positive. I think fear is the unknown. And it's the lack of information creates fear. It creates chaos. And I'm providing a part of the solution by providing this data.

HM: How frustrated were you, and have you been by your inability to get the information from the government itself?

OD: I wouldn't use the word frustrated. I would say disappointed as a taxpayer and as a citizen and as a dad. You want to understand the risk level when you send your kids to school. And this data helps everybody understand. In the pandemic, we can only rely on data. So yeah, disappointed would be the word.

HM: What is your assessment of the way the Quebec government has handled the back-to-school plan this year?

OD: I think the back-to-school plan has some downfalls. For example, there's no social distancing in class. They introduced the concept of a bubble, which is the entire class of maybe sometimes 20 to 30 to 35 students. There's no mask in class, but on the outside of class. They haven't looked at seriously the ventilation problem or the lack of air circulation from outside in the classrooms.

HM: Aside from gathering and posting this data, you have a full-time job. How much of your time is this taking up?

OD: Too much. [laughing] Many, many hours a day. But I think it's my contribution to society and to help others.

HM: If the government data is to your satisfaction when they start posting it, do you think you'll stop doing this?

OD: I guess the first start is not good because today they've announced half of the cases that I'm reporting. So I would not shut it down today, let's put it this way. But in a few weeks, we'll monitor the situation. I don't think people have confidence in the way that that data has been published in Quebec during the pandemic. There's been all sorts of papers stuck in fax machines explaining reporting gaps, or 80 cases that were forgotten from one day to another, or samples that were contaminated, causing different numbers. So it's been very publicly in the media that data reporting is problematic in the Quebec government.

HM: I have to just ask you finally how your own kids, how your family has been handling the return to school?

OD: I am actually on the positive side of the spectrum, where my two kids are very happy to be back in school, see their friends, interact with them, still social distancing. The school that my kids go to are very serious about COVID. They have introduced additional measures over and above what the government is asking for, like taking the temperature. These things reassure my kids and myself and the mother of the kids.

HM: All right, Mr. Drouin, thank you very much.

OD: You're quite welcome.

HM: All right. Bye-bye.

OD: Bye-bye.

CH: Olivier Drouin is a Montreal father of two teenaged girls, and the creator of an online map that shows which schools have confirmed cases of COVID-19 across Quebec. We reached him in Montreal.

Caledonia Journalist Arrest

Guest: Karl Dockstader

CH: Karl Dockstader says he was just doing his job. And he was arrested for it. Mr. Dockstader is a freelance journalist, and the co-host of the Indigenous radio show “One Dish, One Mic”. He spent all last week covering what's known as the 1492 Land Back Lane camp in Caledonia, about an hour southwest of Toronto. The camp was set up in July by members of the Six Nations of the Grand River, who oppose a neighbourhood development on the land — land they say the Haudenosaunee people never ceded to Canada. Since then, at least 17 people have been arrested. On Wednesday, Karl Dockstader became one of them. We reached him in Niagara Falls, Ontario.

HM: Mr. Dockstader, how did you learn that you were going to be arrested?

KARL DOCKSTADER: I learned by email.

HM: What did it say?

KD: The email said that it was from Detective Constable Bergeron, from OPP-Haldimand. And it said that she needed to talk to me in regards to Mackenzie Meadows.

HM: So what did you do?

KD: I didn't think anything of it. It actually went to my media account, so I just thought it was clarification on an immediate matter. [chuckling] So I put it off for a while. And then eventually, I called the constable, who indicated that she intended to charge me.

HM: What was she going to charge you with?

KD: I found out that I was going to be charged with mischief and failure to comply with a court order in regards to Mackenzie Meadows. I told her immediately that I was working on a story, and that I was a member of the media and a journalist and that I shouldn't be charged.

HM: Umm-hmm. Now, there are two court orders in place which restrict anyone blocking any roads into Haldimand County, where the camp's located, or from occupying the construction site. Explain why you were there?

KD: So I've been going. The people that reclaim the territory, the land defenders, moved in on July 19th. We were alerted immediately, myself and my colleague, co-host of "One Dish, One Mic", we went down immediately to start to document their reclamation process. And then on the week of August 23rd, I decided that it would be a good idea to go and to have an immersive journalism expense, to actually stay at the camp and to really get a feel for what was happening.

HM: And was it well-known that you were there as a journalist?

KD: Well, I had run into two OPP officers on August 25th. So I was documenting the ad-hoc police station that they had. And they questioned what I was doing. I was taking video. I explained that I was working. I gave him a business card, again, with my information on it. Once they saw that I was with the media, they backed off. They just observed me taking my video. And that was it.

HM: I think there's probably a lot of people who have not heard of this particular land dispute. Can you explain the background a bit? Tell us what's at play regarding this land?

KD: Yeah, so this is part of the Haldimand tract. What had happened is that all the way back in 1784, the British Crown had promised the Six Nations people that they could continue their way of life within six miles on either side of the Grand River and had given large tracts of land. Through a series of land thefts and a whole bunch of other actions, the land base of the Six Nations people has been greatly diminished. They protested the entire length of time that this land base has been diminished. But things came to a head in 2006, when there was a standoff there for several months that still hasn't been resolved 14 years later. But basically, what ended up happening was there was a slowdown on development in and around the area between Six Nations and Caledonia until some new development had been coming along. Land defenders decided that they wanted to put a halt to this particular development.

HM: The Six Nations of the Grand River elected council did agree to this neighbourhood development in exchange for two hundred thousand dollars and job opportunities. Why, then, are so many people opposing it?

KD: Yeah, they had 40 acres that were going to be returned as well. It was quite the deal. The concern is that a lot of people in Six Nations don't think that the elected council has much of a mandate to be doing this type of negotiation. There'll be discussion about what's going to happen with development and what kind of options Six Nations have because that's something that gets lost in all of this, too, outside of the politics, and the history, and the treaties, and all of that talk. Six Nations is bursting at the seams. And they're bursting at the seams with young people. It's not very easy to expand reservation territory. So they literally have no place to go. And then they have all of these unsettled treaties.

HM: We have reached out to the OPP for comment and haven't heard back yet. Since, you know, word of you being arrested as a journalist has come out, what have you heard? Have police said anything more about why they arrested you?

KD: No. I mean, I reviewed some vague comments that the police have put out. But, I mean, they've said things along the lines of they're not going to comment on the specifics. I mean, speculating from my end wouldn't be healthy.

HM: Right. But in terms of you telling them you're a journalist, that didn't move things?

KD: I'm still surprised. And that's why in my observation, I mean, you know, I had mentioned that I had posted a video, perhaps the video was too much of an editorial nature, you know, I don't know. I mean, again, I'm not the police, so I don't know if they're splitting hairs about... I mean, I was there for a week. So I was eating with people. If I walked by a garbage and it needed to be taken out, I would take it out. I was singing, playing lacrosse, I was documenting all of this while I was there. But I'm not sure what standard the OPP is using?

HM: What's next? Will you be going back?

KD: That's the million dollar question. So it's tough because I honestly believe that I'm being silenced as a member of the media. I think they're being restricted to go back to the secretary, to go back to the reclamation grounds themselves specifically is a restriction and a form of strataling. And I don't think that it's fair. But the reality is that I have criminal charges now. So my role as a journalist has been brought into my house. I’ve had to talk to my family about what could potentially happen, once you have a criminal record. Those ramifications can sit with you for the rest of your life. So I have a real decision that I have to make and it's going to be a hard one because the story still needs to be told.

HM: What have you said to your family?

KD: I asked my daughters what they thought? And my oldest daughter actually connected my arrest to systemic racism.

HM: How old is she?

KD: She's twelve years old.

HM: So how did that make you feel, hearing that?

KD: It was difficult. I really wanted things to be different for this generation. I mean, there's a lot of talk of reconciliation. There's a lot of talk of nation-to-nation recognition. But then when it comes to something practical about what does s land-backed-action actually look like? Well, like what will actual reconciliation look like? And then something like this happens where Indigenous people are criminalized across the board. And so it's hard for me to realize that at that young age that they're already aware of systemic racism. You'd like to think that as a society that our kids wouldn't have to worry about these things. But we've got another generation now where you and I haven't figured this out. So we're putting this burden on our kids to figure out.

HM: Well, Mr. Dockstader, we will continue to track developments around your case. Thank you very much for talking to us.

KD: Thanks for having me.

HM: All right. Bye-bye.

KD: Bye.

CH: Karl Dockstader is a freelance journalist and the co-host of “One Dish, One Mic”. We reached him in Niagara Falls.

Wingham trucks into cottage

Guest: Mark Kilby

CH: Five years ago, Mark Kilby and his partner moved into a lovely 16th-century cottage in the small village of Wingham in England. They were looking forward to a peaceful life there. And then the cargo trucks started hitting their home. Which they have continued to do. To the point where Mr. Kilby's home has been called "Britain's most-hit home". Since 2015, trucks have driven into it more than 20 times. We reached Mark Kilby at his cottage, between truck impacts, in Wingham, England.

HM: Mr. Kilby, when was the last time your house was hit by a truck?

MARK KILBY: It was last week, it was last Monday evening, about 8:30 in the evening. I'd been out with my son and actually had a very nice evening, and I came home to find a 44-ton articulated truck parked by the road and quite a bit of my roof just laying down on the road, and other parts of my house dislodged.

HM: When was the previous time your house was hit by a truck?

MK: June of this year. And this was a really a record-breaking hit last week. Because in June, it was quite nasty damage. And we had it repaired on the day that it was hit again, three-and-a-half-hours later. So the builders packed up at 5:00 last Monday. And I jokingly said to them, leave your ladders here because you'll probably need them quite soon, not thinking that it would be three-and-a-half-hours later that the house would be hit again.

HM: You're talking about quite a significant amount of damage. I mean, you described sort of rubble from your roof on the ground?

MK: On most of the occasions, we're talking about roof slates, possibly some parts of a window, gouging to the front of the building, you know, bit of the plaster, the rendering coming out. But there have been one or two others that have been a bit more significant than that. But what you're looking at here is a 16th-century cottage, which is basically made of wood and a glorified form of modern straw. So if there's no reinforcement there to protect you from a 44-ton lorry as it goes along the front of your building, and we literally are right on the road, which is the problem. You know, this was a horse and cart track not that long ago, and now it's being used by completely inappropriate vehicles.

HM: It's not just that you're right on the road, or that you have particularly bad luck, it's how the house is situated as well, correct?

MK: Absolutely. We're opposite a junction. This is the key problem. So vehicles that should not be trying to turn, they're turning right. As it turns around, the big trailer on the back hits the side and takes the kind of side off of our roof. The solution is very simple, and that is to stop vehicles over a certain axle weight turning there. But our local authority, which is Kent County Council, refuses to accept that there's a problem. And all I get told is we are monitoring the situation.

HM: But you've pointed out this is a 16th-century cottage. It's a listed property, as far as I understand it historically?

MK: Yes.

HM: Don't they value that?

MK: No, they don't. They clearly don't. We moved in here in 2015, and I was aware of the fact that there had been one or two problems. But in fact, the problem's become worse because traffic doesn't get lighter, traffic gets heavier.

HM: Is there not another route the trucks could be taking?

MK: There is. That's exactly why I'm objecting to it because they could ask these vehicles to take an alternative route. And they just refuse to listen, and I'm told the same thing repeatedly. I mean, you know, this is around 20 hits now since 2015. So the most we had in one year was eight. And that's when I put up CCTV cameras on my house. And the least we've had is two, which is so far, this year. So you could take a mean average of about four hits a year, which I consider to be more than enough. And an action, you know, should be taken.

HM: How much does all this damage cost?

MK: The least value you would put on the damage would be around £2,000. A serious here is anything around the £6,000 to £7,000 mark to have repaired. So, again, you could be looking at something like £60,000 or £70,000 for these repairs.

HM: Right.

MK: Which is paid by the insurer of the vehicles.

HM: Right.

MK: That's why I put the cameras up. Because prior to that, I was paying for the repairs because the drivers wouldn't stop. You know, I'm at work, and other people are out, and there's no real witnesses to some of this. That's not a very pleasant situation. And it's, I mean, obviously, even if someone else is paying for it, it's not a pleasant thing because you then in negotiation with insurance companies. And in fact, today, you know, I've been told I've now got to deal with a loss adjuster who's going to come and look at the damage from the June incident. And then I'll be waiting for someone from the Polish company, which was from the incident last week. And, in the meantime, I pay the builders who come here. And so I'm out of pocket for that amount of money. But if it does blight the property, I mean, people often say to me, well, why don't you move? Well, it's not exactly that attractive to people to move into a building that's particularly if you live in a rural village in Kent, you're moving to that one generally because you're retiring or you want a quiet life. Well, you're certainly not going to get that if you move to this house, are you?

HM: [laughing] No, I guess not.

MK: You know, I kind of more or less have to give it away to sell it.

HM: Now, you're getting a lot of media attention. You're talking to us in Canada because this is just getting to be kind of ridiculous [MK scoffs]. Is that, do you think, going to help your case with the local council?

MK: Well, I'd like to think so. I mean, it previously being reported in the Kent area. And, you know, it's been called the "most-hit house in Britain". And I think that's completely true. I mean, if someone else is being as much as this, I'd like to meet them and, you know, go and commiserate with them, and maybe have a few drinks together and, you know? But on a serious note, it's only a matter of time by the law of averages before there's a more serious incident. And damage to property is one thing. And yeah, OK, it's a pain, and it's not very nice, and it's stressful. But, you know, damage to life and limb is much worse.

HM: Yes, it most certainly is.

MK: These vehicles have to go up on the pavement. Now, the schoolchildren walking down there, because I've got a school behind me, a primary school, and a lot of elderly people living in the village. And, you know, I don't want to be overly dramatic, but of course, there's potential for, you know, a pedestrian to be hit.

HM: Mmm-hmmm.

MK: This is a relatively straightforward problem with complete refusal by the authorities to accept that something needs to happen. And I just have to look at it as I'm expendable or this property is expendable in their eyes.

HM: Mr. Kilby, good luck getting that turned around. Because it does sound like quite a mess you're dealing with. Thank you for telling us all about it.

MK: Thank you very much. Bye-bye.

CH: Mark Kilby is the owner of Britain's "most-hit home" — a 16th-century cottage that keeps getting hit by cargo trucks. We reached Mr. Kilby in the village of Wingham, England. And you can see pictures on our webpage at: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Ambient]

Flat earthers in quarantine

CH: Pythagoras, dork. Sir Isaac Newton, idiot. Astrophysicists, more like astro-fictionists. In the parlance of flat earthers, all these characters are called “ballers” — dupes in a conspiracy to convince us the earth is a ball. So to defy these ballers while the rest of us are trying to avoid the end of the world, one Italian couple set out to go directly to it. The unnamed couple sold their car, bought a boat and set off from northern Sicily to the island of Lampedusa, which is where they figured they'd find the very edge of our flat planet. Unfortunately, they went the wrong way. They got lost and exhausted. And when they arrived at the wrong destination, they were put in quarantine. After trying to escape twice, they just abandoned their plans, and their boat, and took a ferry back home. One bemused Italian official found their navigational methodology inconsistent with their beliefs. He told the newspaper La Repubblica, “The funny thing is that they oriented themselves with the compass, an instrument that works on the basis of terrestrial magnetism, a principle that they as flat earth ours should reject.” Disoriented, disheartened and eventually defeated whether the world is round which it is, or a large flat circle, which it is not. They ended up in bad shape.

Part two: Alaska runway lights, Megalodon study

Alaska runway lights

Guest: Ida Nelson

CH: In remote Alaskan communities, planes are a lifeline. That was certainly the case last Friday night when a plane was sent to Igiugig to take a young girl to hospital in Anchorage. But when the flight arrived, the runway lights wouldn't turn on. So the locals sprang into action. Ida Nelson was one of them. We reached her in Igiugig, Alaska.

HM: Ms. Nelson, first of all, tell us what you were doing when you first heard this plane circling overhead?

IDA NELSON: I was just finishing up taking a steam bath.

HM: So you were having a steam bath. What did you do then?

IN: Once I saw the plane fly over, we, my daughter and I, went to the airport and checked to see if we can help.

HM: So you sprung out of that bath and went into action?

IN: Well, yeah, after we got dressed, of course. [chuckling]

HM: Why did you think you had to run to the airport anyway? I mean, would you normally do that when a plane was overhead?

IN: Well, it was 11:30 at night. And normally, planes don't fly over at 11:30 at night. And usually when it does, that means that it's an emergency.

HM: So would there not be other people to take care of that emergency?

IN: There were. There were other people there, you know, to be able to take care of the emergency. But we work together pretty well as a community. And I went to go ask the local pilot that was trying to help get the lights on the runway if the lights were coming on, he said no. And I asked should I go run to the end of the runway, and he said, you can try. Me and my daughter, we went down on my four-wheeler or ATV as some people call it, and we ran down to the end of the runway and sat there for a few moments and, you know, looked up to the sky to see where the plane was. And my neighbour called me, and she asked me, did the plane land yet? And I'm like, no, it did not. And she goes, should I send more people? I'm like, yes.

HM: So your neighbour said they were gonna send more vehicles. What happened?

IN: So, cause I was down there at the airport, and she gave me a call, and she was like, did the plane land yet? And I'm like, no, I didn't. And she asked, should I send more people down? I’m like, yes, call more people. I mean, the more vehicles, the merrier. And we quickly hung up. And by the time I got there, to towards the end of it, she said that she made 32 phone calls for help.

HM: How many people live in your community?

IN: We have approximately 70 people.

HM: So that sounds like she called pretty much everyone?

IN: Yes. Every household, almost every household and every cell phone number that she had.

HM: Do you know what she said to them to get them to all come out?

IN: I know what I said to them. [chuckling] Cause I made a phone call or two. And I just said, you guys need to come to the airport right now. There's a medevac plane trying to land, grab a vehicle with lights, and come to the airport.

HM: How did you go about lighting the runway?

IN: The way that we were able to light it up, was that, at first, I thought maybe a good idea was to light up both sides of the runway, so the pilot can be able to see, you know, both sides of it to know which way to go. But the pilot that was trying to work on the lights at the airport he has his own airplane. And so he got on to his plane, realized there wasn't like a communication between the ground in the air. And so he started communicating with the pilot in the air with his plane. And then, in turn, he was communicating with my neighbour's husband, who was, you know, telling people what the pilot wanted to do. And so he eventually got like a bunch of other people to line up the runway at every light and in between each light. The pilot was like, OK, well, I'm going to do a low flyover. I'm going to see if I like it. And if I do, I'm going to turn around and land. And I don't want anybody to move. And so once the plane landed, the health practitioner that was on call that night, she came to me and told me, she said, pilot likes it. No one move. Only person that can move is me. And so, like, she was even on the ground, on the runway, you know, hoping and praying that this plane con land for her patient.

HM: Wow!

HM: Because once the plane was able to land, she was able to move, helped got the patient on the plane. And then once the patient was on the plane, she went back to her position on the runway and waited for the plane to take off.

HM: What does it say to you about your community that you could all band together so quickly, so late at night to help like this?

IN: It feels amazing. You know that if someone is in trouble, someone needs help, you know you can rely on your neighbour for anything.

HM: Now, you know, I understand there have been long-standing issues with these particular runway lights, that you've had people trying to repair them before. Is there a feeling there that authorities could be doing more to make sure, you know, remote communities like yours don't have to do things like this in an emergency?

IN: Well, I'm pretty sure they probably would have been fixed a lot sooner if it wasn't so complicated due to COVID. Also, our grounds are really frozen and cold at times. And, you know, they've been out there a few times before, they actually got fixed. And, you know, just trying to assess the problem and the issues. Because when COVID hit our village, we closed down our village for nearly three months. And that means that even though as neighbours, we didn't go visiting each other, we didn't like give each of our hugs when we saw each other. So it really hit hard here a little bit. But now that we're adjusted to it. And, you know, have travel allowances because the state people are essential.

HM: Well, it's great that you're able to pull together in this way. Thank you very much for telling us the story.

IN: You're very welcome.

HM: Yeah, I’m glad it all worked out. Bye-bye.

IN: Bye.

CH: We reached Ida Nelson in Igiugig, Alaska.

Highway of Tears totem pole

CH: Today people gathered for a special celebration on Yellowhead Highway 16 — also known as the Highway of Tears. With trucks, ropes and ladders they raised a two-and-a-half storey totem pole — a memorial honouring missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. Gladys Radek is one of the people who came up with the idea to create the memorial. For almost ten years, she has organised a 350-kilometre walk along the highway to remember those who have been lost. One of those women was her niece, Tamara Lynn Chipman. She disappeared in 2005, at the age of 22. Gladys Radek spoke to "Daybreak North" about the memorial totem pole.

CAROLINA DE RYK: Do you think people who regularly make the drive between Prince Rupert and Terrace? Do you think there are still people who are unaware of the missing murdered women and girls who have lost their lives along this stretch of road?

GLADYS RADEK: Yes, I think that it's not an issue with most people. And to us family members, it is. You know, it's a very serious thing that some of us are missing our loved ones —Tamara's anniversary 15 years coming up, Alberta Williams, 30 years. You know, this is long enough. And that's what the idea of the pole was to raise that awareness. So when people, we get visitors from all over the world that come up here and they're going to question, wow, what is that beautiful pole for? And, you know, people will educate them on it.

CDR: Yeah, if people pull over to take a closer look at this pole, what will it say? What will it tell them about this terrible story?

GR: The pole is absolutely stunning, and I think it will give everybody a very good sense of healing. I think that it's going to be very significant for the families, I think.

CDR: What will you be thinking about when it is raised?

GR: [deep sigh] I'll be thinking a lot about Tamara. [breaking down into tears] It's been 15 years. And there's been a lot of work that's been done since she went missing by not just myself, but by activists and families right across the country again. And when I bring it back home, Tamara, this was her home in Terrace. And that's what I'll be thinking about. This one's for you, my girl. [sniffles]

CH: That was Gladys Radek. She helped create a Highway of Tears memorial totem pole for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. Today Ms. Radek joined others to raise the totem pole, just outside Terrace, B.C. She was speaking with "Daybreak North" host, Carolina de Ryk.

Sophia Farrar obit

CH: When Kitty Genovese was brutally murdered in New York in 1964, the supposed indifference of bystanders made headlines. Two weeks after her killing, the New York Times published an article claiming no fewer than 38 witnesses saw or heard the attack, and did nothing. That story of urban apathy and neglect was the catalyst for decades of research on the "so-called bystander effect". It was also a lie. It turned out many witnesses were concerned. And that some did call police. And there's one person, in particular, to whom that early reporting was especially unfair: Sophia Farrar. Ms. Farrar was a neighbour and friend of Kitty Genovese — and ran to her side as she lay dying. Sophia Farrar died last week. She was 92 years old. In 2015, Kitty Genovese's brother, Bill, made a documentary about Ms. Farrar, and the other witnesses who sought to help when they heard his sister scream. From "The Witness", here's a clip of Bill Genovese, asking Sophia Farrar's son, Michael, what he remembers about that night.

MICHAEL FARRAR: The scream, loud, loud scream, horrible blood-curdling scream. And it woke me up.

BILL GENOVESE: How many people do you think heard it?

MF: [blowing out] Just looking at the windows, 40, 50, could be 60 — because it was so loud. The whole neighbourhood had to hear it. And this neighborhood, back in the 60s, I remember a lot of the older people, they had numbers on their arm. They were in concentration camps. That type of a person might not want to get involved with the authorities because of what happened with the Nazis. So, you know, you can't blame people for being afraid. But that night, when I walked up the hallway, my parents were up, this window was open and my father was looking out the window. He didn't see anything. So my parents went back to bed. About 20 minutes later or so, somebody called my mom. And that's when my mom said to my father, Kitty’s in the hall bleeding.

CH: As soon as she got that phone call, Michael Farrar's mother, Sophia, sprang into action. Running down her building's steps to find Kitty Genovese and hold her while she died. To Bill Genovese, that decision meant everything. And in the final scenes of his documentary, he gets to tell Sophia Farrar as much.

BG: This is unbelievable.

SOPHIA FARRAR: I know! She was my friend. And I knew she was hurt and she needed help. That was my reason for flying down those stands. [voice breaking] I only hope that she knew it was me, that she wasn’t alone.

CH: Fifty-six years ago, Sophia Farrar held Kitty Genovese while she lay dying. Last week, Ms. Farrar died at the age of 92.

Megalodon study

Guest: Jack Cooper

CH: If we are to trust the movie "The Meg", the megalodon was a shark enormous huge enough to make a surfboard look like a popsicle stick. But not huge enough to survive the sheer toughness of Jason Statham. However, to put it in non-Statham-related terms, we didn't know how big the real-life megalodon was, until this week — when new research published in the journal Scientific Reports established its true size. And though the scientists knew it was big -- they didn't know it it was quite this big. Jack Cooper is one of the authors of the new study. We reached him just outside of Glasgow, in Scotland.

HM: Mr. Cooper, just how big was the megalodon?

JACK COOPER: So the megalodon, based on researchers estimated its maximum size to be anywhere between 15 and 18 metres. So at most, about 60 feet.

HM: That's pretty big. Can you give us a visual comparison, though? Maybe compare it to a human or a bus?

JC: Oh, of course. So the most common comparison you'll see on the Internet is that it's about as long as two busses.

HM: That is an enormous creature. How did you figure out its size?

JC: So a lot of what goes into figuring out its size comes from the teeth, as they're by far the most common fossils we have. So by measuring the height of the tooth in great whites, which have very similar teeth to megalodon, and comparing those lengths to the total length of those sharks, we can extrapolate those relationships to megalodon.

HM: So where did you get the samples that you used?

JC: So our samples were actually not based on the teeth themselves. We were aiming to figure out how big the specific body parts of the megalodon were, such as the heads or the dorsal fin. And to do that, we took the measurements of those body parts in modern sharks like the great whites, the makos and the beagle shark. And compared that to their total length.

HM: And do you have fossils that you can use, sections of fossils you can use to help you extrapolate?

JC: So in the case of megalodon, there actually aren't really that many skeletal fossils left. Their fossils are almost entirely teeth, but because the living sharks we compared them to are still around, you can actually take those measurements from those sharks themselves.

HM: All right. And then I guess you can also break down how different parts of its body would look. For example, the fin. How big would the fin be?

JC: So the dorsal fin, which is obviously the fin you see rising out of the water when a shark’s swimming around, that then would have been in a 16-metre megalodon, about one-point-six-metres tall, which is very close in comparison to the height of an adult human being.

HM: So what can you tell us about what it would have looked like beyond its size?

JC: So the interesting thing with megalodon is that we have a pretty decent idea of how it hunted and how it got big. And it probably fed on small whales and other marine mammals. And marine mammals are also a common diet of the great white shark. Meanwhile, it's also able to control its own body temperature, just like makos and the great whites, which tells us that it probably had a very similar kind of body form, but probably a lot more robust to account for its huge size.

HM: Can we assume, besides eating whales, it would have been like modern sharks and able to eat pretty much anything it wanted?

JC: Pretty much, yeah. [warm chuckle]

HM: And where would it have been located? I mean, at what kind of depths, what kinds of areas of the globe?

JC: So the megalodon teeth have been found on every continent except Antarctica. And we think the megalodon lived in very coastal habitats all around the world. So not the deepest depths, but probably near the coastlines feeding on whales that would've been hanging around.

HM: And you said it's able to regulate its body temperature. So would that account for the fact to be found in so many places?

JC: We think so, yes.

HM: So where does your fascination with megalodons come from?

JC: So my fascination actually began with watching BBC program called “Sea Monsters”. I would have been about six years old at the time, and it was a guy named Nigel Marvin, who was going through prehistoric seas, or the most deadly prehistoric seas, as he put it. And meeting the big apex predator at those times. And then one of them, he went back four million years ago and met the megalodon. And little me for that was just incredible such a giant shark could have actually existed. And it just hooked me ever since.

HM: And really, it's been with you all that time?

JC: Yeah, all that time. I actually today just spoke to Nigel Marvin, the guy who was on that show, because he found my work and was very congratulatory. So I actually today got to tell him that it was all back to him.

HM: That's a lovely thing to be able to share with someone who's inspired you so much.

JC: Yeah, it felt pretty weird.

HM: I think a lot of people know about megalodons, or at least think they do from the movie The Meg. Have you seen it?

JC: Yes, I have seen the movie, and I've actually also read the book it was based on.

HM: And what do you think of it? Is that realistic?

JC: Well, not in terms of how the shark has survived, because, as you know, the film claims that the megalodon is found at the bottom of the deepest trench on earth, the Mariana Trench. The only life you get there is microscopic life and tiny micro shrimp organisms. And a shark that fed on whales and would have needed a huge amount of calories would not have possibly survived on that. And further still, their megalodon is portrayed as about 20 to 25 metres, which is a fair amount too beg, not taking away from the fact it was still a very huge creature, of course.

HM: I haven't seen the movie, I have to admit, but I have seen the trailer. Can we presume the real megalodon was as aggressive in the movie? [laughing]

JC: [laughing] Well, I guess it depends.

HM: I suppose it does. So what's next for your research?

JC: I am actually working on another megalodon study at the moment, where we're hoping to take what we've done just now and try and make a computer 3D model, and calculate its body mass and see what we can learn from that.

HM: Any temptation to make a model of it, to sort of give us a better sense of the size of this thing?

JC: Well, the hope of the computer model is we’ll get a good amount of these on the mass. And the hope is someone will adopt that and make a full physical model out of it.

HM: Right. I think it would be really quite amazing to be able to see it up close.

JC: Oh, yeah. I would love to see it done.

HM: Well, I really appreciate you telling us about your research. Thank you very much.

JC: Oh, thank you very much for having me, Helen.

HM: Okay, take care. Bye-bye.

JC: Bye-bye.

CH: Jack Cooper is part of the research team that determined just how big the megalodon shark was. We reached Mr. Cooper near Glasgow, Scotland. And you can find more on this story on our webpage at: www.cbc.ca/aih.

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September 04, 2020 Episode Transcript

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