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The AIH Transcript for May 17, 2017

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

CAROL OFF: Hello, I'm Carol.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Good evening. I'm Jeff Douglas. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

JD: Tonight…

CO: Trouble was brewing. In Thunder Bay a man named Thomas White served fancy espresso to happy customers. But according to Vice journalists he served hatred and racism on the neo-Nazi podcast he hosted.

JD: Out of circulation. An 81-year-old lifelong blood donor in Australia gives his final donation. And because of a rare antibody, Doctors estimate he has seen more than two million lives.

CO: Turning the tides. After studying the movement of water, snow and ice around the planet, Scientists at NASA reach a draining conclusion — human activity is changing the natural flow of things.

JD: The view from his side of the fence. A former member of the Israel Defense Forces offers his perspective on why Israeli soldiers shot so many Palestinians on Monday — and whether it was justified

CO: Fighting trims. A national barbershop chain filed a cease-and-desist against the small Nova Scotia barber, but says he'll explain he's going to keep giving fades and not fade away.

JD: And…Luckily only the story is blowing up. Someone in London Ontario left a 100-year-old live artillery shell out with their trash, where our guest stumbled upon it. And tonight he's a man on a munition. As It Happens: The Thursday Edition: Radio that brings you a non-blast from the past.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: Nazi podcaster, Water Study, Artillery shell

Nazi podcaster

Guest: Martin Patriquin

JD: The show was called ‘This Hour Has 88 Minutes.’ It claimed to be Canada's most popular neo-Nazi podcast — but now it is getting some exposure that its hosts don't seem to like. A team of journalists say that they have uncovered one of the host's real identities. Their findings have just been published in Vice. Martin Patriquin co-wrote the article. We reached him in Montreal.

CO: Martin, if someone listens to This Hour Has 88 Minutes, what would they hear?

MARTIN PATRIQUIN: They would hear a riff on the news, I guess, from a white socialist perspective. Talk about how bad immigrants are, how bad various sexual minorities are and how bad, I mean, as any neo-Nazi would declare — how bad Jews are.

CO: With the exception of how bad Jews are, a lot of radio shows, even mainstream ones, have had that kind of invective. What makes this much more extreme, besides the fact that it's so blatantly anti-Semitic?

MP: The language used, it's extremely profane. There's sort of veiled nudges towards violence, N-words words and I-words and all sorts of different lettered words that are used for various different groups. And it basically talks a lot about how whites need their own ethno-state, particularly in Canada.

CO: Obviously ‘This Hour Has 88 Minutes’ is a riff on the CBC show This Hour Has 22 Minutes. So what does the title mean?

MP: 88 means it's the eighth letter of the alphabet, which is H. So it means ‘H-H’ which means “Heil Hitler.”

CO: In your article you describe this show as Canada's most popular neo-Nazi podcast. What kind of listenership does it have?

MP: That is one question that's very difficult to answer. We know that there's at least several thousand. There's not really a counter and it also appears on many different platforms. When they say that they're the most popular, one of the reasons is that they are the most enduring. A lot of these podcasts that are come-and-go, particularly in places like Canada, people lose interest. There's not enough of an audience etc. etc. This one managed to hang around for — I think they had 90 shows when they shut down, rather unexpectedly last week.

CO: And does it seem that they sat down rather unexpectedly last week because you were sniffing around?

MP: I wouldn't say that for sure, but I have a strong suspicion that it had to do with an email that I sent to one of the co-hosts last week, yes.

CO: One of the cohosts being someone you have identified as the one of the co-host of ‘This Hour Has 88 Minutes’ and you say in your article that he appears to be a former Thunder Bay espresso coffee shop owner named Thomas White.

MP: Yeah, yeah that's right. Mr. White owned a coffee shop in Thunder Bay for a period of time called Espresso Joya. Mr. White is an OCAD graduate and an artist who opened Espresso Joya to bring in the artistic community to hold vernissages and to host mostly acoustic music.

CO: Sounds very lefty.

MP: It's extremely lefty. And then on the other side of it, the other side of his life was that he was fomenting a white — or wanting to foment a white ethno-state starting in northern Ontario.

CO: What have you got for proo?

MP: You know, it was an interesting sort of path to it because a lot of these situations, these unmaskings — doxing as they call them — happened as a result of document dumps from Antifa, from antifascist leagues and that groups that go in and hack this stuff out. Mr. White basically doxxed himself. He talked about himself on a lot of these podcasts and through certain little details we were able to surmise that he was in Thunder Bay, that he had a family, he had a family of three and then a family of four more recently, that he lived on the outskirts of town and that he was very, very interested in coffee. He also shared — a couple of his web pages shared a similar IP address and so we were just able to sort of put it all together and figure out that it was this guy.

CO: Can you connect what you allege as far as how the coffee is associated with, not just his by-day lefty side, by his by-night Nazi side?

MP: So he started to have a coffee, I guess, a mail order coffee side business that he called Rising Sun Coffee. What he wanted to do was basically sell coffee and coffee instruments, if you will, you know, grinders and filters and espresso machines etc etc. And his idea was to sort of do this and use roughly five per cent of the proceeds of anything he sold that was going to be donated to the White Nationalist charity of the buyer's choice. So in one case it was the Daily Stormer. Another one was a survivalist group based out of South Africa, a white survivalist group in South Africa. Chris Cantwell, so-called ‘Crying Nazi,’ his legal defense fund etc. etc. That was the idea.

CO: So then are you saying that there is a connection between all of these various groups, with what happened in Charlottesville, what the Daily Stormer represents, that they're all connected through these networks of coffee?

MP: Yeah, and as far as coffee was concerned it wasn't around for a crazy amount of time, about a year and a bit. But he got certain traction with an American podcast's, one specifically called ‘Fatherland,’ which is one of the more popular ones in the States. He sent a bunch of it to this guy and he tried it on air and he called it — this is perfect Nazi coffee. Everybody should buy this stuff.

CO: Are you sure of your evidence? Are you convinced that you've got the right guy?

MP: Oh, yeah, for sure, yeah we have it dead to rights.

CO: And have you tried to contact him?

MP: Yeah, yeah we tried to contact him about a week and a bit before public publishing and the whole network went down. So White, within a few hours of me contacting him, the ‘88 Minutes’ went offline two of the cohosts backed out of their accounts, canceled their accounts on various white nationalist forums. Mr White certainly didn't respond to me. And I got a letter, an e-mail, from the TRS legal team, whatever that is. The TRS being ‘The Right Stuff,’ which is the white nationalist forum in question telling him that I wasn't allowed to use anything that was broadcast during the during those podcasts. We have backups of everything, so that wasn't really a problem.

CO: There are similarities between the story you're telling and that of one we did just a few weeks ago that reporters in Montreal exposed, they believe, a connection that this some named Zeiger, who is a neo-Nazi is actually a man that they identified in Montreal. And these networks are very difficult to prove. So are they joined together? Is there a connection between these networks, the ones in Montreal and the ones you identified that you believe come out of Thunder Bay?

MP: So the one connection that we were able to establish between ‘88 Minutes,’ Mr. White and Zeiger here Montreal, was a guy named Gabriel Sohier Chaput. Zeiger, as he calls himself, appeared on ‘88 Minutes’ four times during the run and was a guest on the show fairly often. So yes, these people are all aware of each other, they are all talking to each other and they're all doing it for one very simple cause. That is to say have a whites-only society here in Canada.

CO: Have they committed any crimes?

MP: Not as far as we know, no. The one issue that you could have you could argue in the case of Zeiger and possibly like Mr. White, is hate speech and incitement to violence. That's a potential crime. Now the bar for that is extremely high, as you well know. But other than that there have been no crimes committed as far as I know.

CO: All right. We'll leave it there. We'll be following your coverage. Martin, thank you.

JD: Martin Patriquin and his coauthors investigation of a neo-Nazi podcast is published online at Vice.com. We reached Mr. Patriquin in Montreal.

[Music: Reversed Ambient Tones]

Water Study

Guest: Matthew Rodell

JD: Water it would seem is on the run. A study published yesterday in the journal Nature, says that our planet's water is changing its location — and it is happening fast. From massive ice loss in the Arctic, to bloating in flood prone parts of Canada, to potentially damaging dam construction in China — the researchers at NASA say human activity is having a huge impact on how wet the world is. So much so that Earth's gravitational field is being affected. Matthew Rodell is the chief of hydrological sciences at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre, and the study's lead author. We reached Mr. Rodell in Maryland.

CO: Mr. Rodell, how quickly is the water around us changing?

MATTHEW RODELL: Well, what we did is we studied 34 regions around the world using NASA's GRACE satellites and we found that in those regions some of the most prominent changes were the ice sheets melting, but then some of the other big changes were groundwater depletion around the world caused by water being pumped to irrigate agriculture. These are huge changes in water storage. So Lake Mead is the largest manmade reservoir in the United States, hold about 32 gigatons of water, each gigaton is about 200,000 Olympic size swimming pools full of water. The changes that we were measuring were on the order of the size of Lake Mead during this period or larger. 10 of these 34 regions experienced changes that would have been about ten times the size of Lake Mead.

CO: And how much of what's happening to this shift in water, this dramatic change is manmade?

MR: We studied 34 regions around the world where we saw the most prominent changes or trends in terrestrial water storage. Of those, we said that about eight of them are associated with climate change. About 14 were associated with direct human impacts like groundwater pumping. And only about 12 of them are caused by natural variability alone.

CO: So what are the implications for people living on this planet?

MR: Well, water is one of our most important resources, if not, the most important resource. So it's critical that we be able to track its movements around the world, and in particular in regions that are water stressed, places like the southern high plains in the U.S., or the Central Valley in California or also northern India. These regions are regions that rely heavily on groundwater for growing crops and they’re some of the most productive regions of the world for ensuring that there's enough food for the world. And in those regions we see groundwater being depleted and it's unsustainable what they’re doing right now, pumping too much water or the ground faster than it’s being recharged. And of course, that's scary when you think about a growing population around the world and the importance of being able to feed them in the future.

CO: And then what does it say about those regions, like we've just seen in Canada, we're seeing right now huge problem with flooding in British Columbia. There's been a massive amount of water. What happens to this place that are getting too much water?

MR: In a lot of cases when there's flooding it's just part of the natural variability. One thing that's useful about the data is we can use it to sort of forecast when there may be flooding. So if you look at a region and it's up near its maximum terrestrial water storage, then we know that if they get more rain or more snow or snow melt then they're likely to have flooding in the future. But what climate models predict for the future is that the some of the wetter northern latitudes will become wetter in the future, whereas some of the mid-latitude arid and semi-arid regions will become drier. So for Canada that could potentially mean more flooding in the future.

CO: How are you measuring things? How are you measuring and evaluating, you're using the satellites, just describe the process by which you're finding this out? Because this is new information, this is what you've been able to get out of the data from the satellites. What are they telling you?

MR: Well, the GRACE satellites are unique in that most Earth observing satellites are sort of looking down and measuring different wavelengths of light. But the GRACE satellites are really feeling Earth's gravity field, and they do that because satellite orbits are affected by small variations in Earth's gravity. So, you know, that gravity is related to mass and so there's a big mountain range for example there's more gravitational potential there and so it affects the orbits of the satellites as they pass over it. So think of ocean tides or ocean circulation or huge changes in mass and it turns out over land, if you can account for the ocean effects and the atmospheric effects using models, what's left is changes in mass that are caused by movements of water around the earth. So imagine a big snowstorm dumps a whole lot of snow and there's a huge amount of mass over a large area and it affects the orbits of the satellites in a predictable way so that we can infer how large of a change it was.

CO: So an area that's being depleted of water is actually lighter?

MR: It is. So, it's not light enough that if you're walking over you'd say ‘Oh, I feel lighter today.’ It's very small changes in the gravitational potential but they are large enough that a satellite that's just orbiting around the earth floating with really no other forces on it, will be affected by the small changes in the amount of water.

CO: Just finally, as a hydrologist, you've been watching this for some time, now you've got this data from the satellites. How surprised were you to learn what you did?

MR: Well, when I first started working, there was a day before the satellites launched back in 1997 and my Ph.D. supervisor Jay Famiglietti, at the time suggested I change my focus to look the possible use of GRACE for hydrology and it seemed like a crazy idea. But with 20 years of hindsight it was a great gamble to do that. We were some of the first hydrologists to become involved and many people were very sceptical when GRACE first launched that it would be useful for hydrology, but the sceptics have been proven wrong. It's been fantastic. Remember that many countries around the world are not as good about sharing data as the U.S. and Canada are. So we have these data from GRACE that we could not measure in any other way.

CO: All right, well we'll be looking forward to your future studies. Mr. Rodell, thank you.

MR: Thank you.

JD: Matthew Rodell is the lead author of a new study that says Earth's water supply is migrating — and quickly — and it's affecting Earth's gravitational field. We reached Mr. Rodell in Maryland.

[Music: Guitar Strums]

Japan Train Delay

JD: Dateline Notogawa Station, Japan.

[Music: Dateline Theme]

JD: Last week Japan's transit crisis deepened. As you must recall, last November a horrendous miscalculation took place at Minami Nagareyama station, deeply shaking commuter's faith in Japan's train system. Management issued an abject apology, which read in part quote “On November 14^th, at approximately 944 a.m. a northbound train left Minami Nagareyama station roughly 20 seconds earlier than the time indicated on the timetable. We deeply apologize for the severe inconvenience imposed upon our customers,” unquote. Well, those customers accepted that apology. Presumably they thought it was a one-time debacle, never to be repeated. It is also possible they hadn't noticed. But now an ominous pattern seems to be emerging. A mere seven months and 27 days later, catastrophe has struck again on Japanese rail lines — this time last Friday at Notogawa Station. The train was scheduled to leave that station at 7:12 a.m., yet after a series of shocking errors, it departed at the station at 7:11 and 35 seconds — a full 25 seconds before the appointed time. In its first press release addressing the mistake West Japan Railways said quote “The great inconvenience we placed upon our customers was truly inexcusable.” And in a second to press release it added “We will be thoroughly evaluating our conduct and striving to keep such an incident from occurring again.” Well, we can only hope that Japan recovers from the series of two disasters, because if this unforgivable, over-punctuality continues, things and commuters could really go off the rails.

[Music: Guitar Strums]

Artillery shell

Guest: Danny Vellow

JD: It was a standard old garbage day in London, Ontario this week. Everyone had their trash out to the curb and left it for pickup. But in one case it wasn't a garbage truck that came to collect. It was the local police, the army and the bomb squad. Danny Vellow lives in that neighbourhood. We reached him in London.

CO: Danny, what did you see in your neighbour's garbage?

DANNY VELLOW: Well, I didn't see — I wasn't garbage picking I was just taking the path through the backyard and they threw all the stuff out there the day before, three days before. When I stepped over my fence I almost stepped on an artillery shell.

CO: Artillery shell with the garbage?

DV: Yes, three bags of garbage and an artillery shell. He should've phoned the police right off the bat.

CO: OK, but wait a second. Were you sure right away what you were looking at?

DV: Yeah, from ironworking I worked at the Lac la Biche bombing range many times because I've worked out 25 years in Edmonton as an iron worker all over Canada. So every year you go out to Lac la Biche bombing range, they teach you three hours of the most boring video about bombs. Well, when I seen that bomb I knew it was not an inert bomb. I didn't see no drill holes in it. It was solid brass and I knew it was old.

CO: OK, so you know it wasn't inert? Were you worried? Did you think maybe this could explode?

DV: Oh, yeah. Well I had a doctor's appointment to get my broken shoulder looked at, because I cracked my shoulder blade, and on the way I phoned the police I was 100 feet down from the bomb. By 500 feet from the bomb I figured ‘OK, I won't go to the doctor’s I’ll go back and talk to the police officer because I've got to show him the bomb, right.’ So anyways, I got a phone call, the second phone call, I was at the Beer Store, which was five to ten. And they said “What are you doing at the Beer Store?” I said “I'm not going to doctor’s, I'm going to stand there all day, I'm going to get some beer and I'll be right back there in ten minutes.” So I got back there okay, now the bomb is three feet from me and the police officer drove up with his car right up to me, “Are you Danny from the Beer Store?” “Yes” he says “Where is this bomb?” And I pointed down to it, which was right where his front tire was, two feet away. He backed up right away and he came over and took two pictures. Ten minutes later the bomb squad is here. Ten minutes later the bomb squad took a picture. Ten minutes later Wisconsin, USA phoned them and said “Hey, don't touch it, it's military and they're sending somebody out here.” And then we sat there for 12-14 hours until they picked it up.

CO: You sat out there where? I mean, how close were you to the bomb?

DV: Probably about 70 feet. I made sure there was a big tree in front of me and the police were all away on the other side of the intersection over there. And they sat there all day watching that bomb.

CO: Now do you have any theories as to why there was this artillery shell on your neighbour's garbage?

DV: The people that were renting that apartment, they told me they're brothers. Apparently they're not brothers. And anyways, they offered me some empties. I went over to pick up the empties, they were kicked out. I heard yelling the night before so they were kicked out and then they had new neighbours in there. So anyways, the next day it looked like somebody was sorting out — I think it was the landlord —the good stuff from the bad stuff, you know. These two brothers were nefarious. The truck they were driving had no door handles on either side, they said they were broken into, it was probably a stolen vehicle.

CO: OK just back to the shell. So you think that these brothers —who were not really brothers — may have put this out with the kind of trash? Why would they have an artillery shell from World War I?

DV: No kidding. How does a 100-year-old bomb make it from a hundred years ago till today without blowing up? Where the hell has that bombed been in a hundred years to get here? That’s a military shell that should have been found in Europe, that you dig up in the farmland somewhere, not here in Canada. Anyways, the police told me I broke two records. I found the biggest bomb by a civilian and I found the oldest bomb by a civilian, which was a World War I artillery shell. A 90-pound shell, two feet long. And they said it had dynamite power of 24 sticks, and it was very hot.

CO: And so this could have gone off? I mean, in the right conditions.

DV: If somebody mishandled it, yes. Imagine a 100-year-old bomb. There’s elderly guy here, that guy actually panicked. “That's an artillery shell.” He's trying to tell a police of an artillery shell, they said the bomb squad’s right there and they can't even touch it. Military wouldn't let them.

CO: But they did eventually take it away, right?

DV: Yeah, the military showed up and took it about seven o'clock or so.

CO: And do you think they took it and they blew it up?

DV: Well they took it to Borden and they blew it up there — they have facilities there. And the police told me, “Danny, you broke a record and that was a spectacular explosion.” No kidding. I wanted to make a lamp out of it. I dsid “Hey, can I get it back?” They said “Danny, we blew up this morning.” And the guy, he's been 20 some years in the force as a bomb explosion guy, which is my second time for a bomb in six years. Last time it was a hand grenade he said “Yeah, I remember you.”

CO: You found a hand grenade?

DV: Well I walked into a Money Mart and somebody tried to push a hand grenade underneath the glass and it got stuck in the tray and we were all locked in there by magnetic lock until a bomb squad showed up. So I said “Yeah, six years ago this happened,” he said “I remember that.” I said “I was the guy inside the building.” The cops took me out and they held me for three hours over that. I had nothing to do with it.

CO: Danny, we have to go. I could listen to you all day. Thank you for telling this story.

DV: Well, you have a beautiful day and happy belated Mother's Day to everybody.

CO: Thank you so much.

DV: Nobody got blewed up.

CO: Nobody got blewed up, and you got your beer. Take care, Danny.

DV: You have a beautiful day. Bye-bye.

CO: Bye.

JD: That was explosive Danny Vellow, he discovered a First World War-era artillery shell on the curb in London, Ontario.

[Music: Jazz]

Part 2: Golden arm' blood donor, Tommy's Barber Shop

Golden arm' blood donor

Guest: James Harrison

JD: James Harrison has been a blood donor all his life. He has been doing it regularly since he was old enough to give, after he survived a childhood surgery thanks to donated blood. And before long doctors discovered that Mr. Harrison's plasma contains a rare antibody — one that is essential for manufacturing a life-saving medication for babies with a rare blood disease. He has had a good run, but now at 81 years old Mr. Harrison has had to stop donating to protect his own health. He made his final donation on Sunday. We reached James Harrison in Gosford, Australia.

CO: James, how did it feel to make that final blood donation on Sunday?

JAMES HARRISON: Very sad, it was the end of an era. 62 years of donating and the party they put on with others an babies thanking me is really a sort of heart wrenching departure.

CO: And so they also they had balloons shaped in the numbers 1173. What did that signify?

JH: That signified the number of donations I have made in my lifetime.

CO: Of blood.

JH: Of blood and plasma donations.

CO: And so the people who were there, who was giving you this big send-off?

JH: The Red Cross, the blood bank service in Sydney. They're the ones that put the kybosh on me going any further so they put in on to lessen the blow.

CO: But now they don't give this kind of send-off to every blood plasma donor in Australia. They did this because you are called ‘The Man With The Golden Arm.’

JH: 1163 out of my right arm and my 10 out of my left arm.

CO: And what is it that makes your blood so special?

JH: I have an antibody called NTD, which is processed and given to mothers to be who are negative blood group with a positive blood group partner. The first child will be normal, but she releases into her system with the birth of that child, a nasty antibody that floats around and when she conceives the next time it goes in and affects the unborn fetus, the unborn child. So they get an injection after the first child and sometimes now a couple more during their pregnancy and that baby will be born OK. Some people have approached me and said ‘Thank you for my seven children. My nine children.’ One lady had 13 children after two miscarriages and that was a problem, the number of miscarriages that were happening up until that time that I discovered this NTD antibody.

CO: And what role then do you play? What did you do? How did you contribute to saving all those babies?

JH: Well, I had the NTD right from the start. Apparently, they think I got it from a blood transfusion many years before. And I decided at that time that I'd become a full blood donor to give back the blood that I had received from my operation. And in 1966 they asked would I take part in the trial for this new product called NTD. Of course I was quite happy to.

CO: And how many babies do you think have been saved because of this antibody in your blood?

JH: Well, I didn't keep them but they told me that over two million. They make quite a number of injections out of a bag of plasma — 55 or 58 NTD donations which they send to the laboratories and they make the viles up to give the injections. They say I’m in every batch that's been made to date.

CO: How does that make you feel to realize that you have saved the lives of more than two million babies?

JH: It feels good because my life was saved with blood transfusions, and while this is probably a different way, I’m doing what I can. It costs nothing a bit of time and the thanks you get makes you shiver. My own daughter had to get an injection because she is negative and her husband's positive. And so I've seen the result because my grandson is near 23 years old and at university. Yes, that makes you feel good that you're doing something, which costs nothing really, just time.

CO: And now how many people are like you have this antibody in their blood?

JH: As far as I know, I think there's probably close to 100. They’re probably not dedicated enough to go every fortnight but there’s about a hundred out there that have NTD. I have a — they’re investigating my NTD because it's a different sort of NTD. They’re investigating to see it if they can clone it.

CO: I understand you were afraid of needles?

JH: I've never once watched the needle go into my arm.

CO: But now it's not going to happen anymore. You're not going to be rolling up your sleeve, you're not going to be giving blood. What will doctors do without you?

JH: I don't know. I don't know. Maybe they are calling for a rerun, who knows? But now at this stage I've just got to find something else to do on a Friday afternoon.

CO: But what are they going to do when they need those antibodies?

JH: Well, there are other up NTD donors out there, so they’ll just have to stretch it out, I’d imagine. They must have others, otherwise they would have probably asked me to stay on, but they'll manage.

CO: Well, James, I'm glad you were there for all those babies. And happy retirement from giving blood.

JH: I’ve been retired from work for 30 years. It's only another half a day a fortnight, I've got to find something to do.

CO: And I'm sure you will. James, thank you so much.

JH: It's my pleasure, Carol, any time.

CO: Take care. Bye-bye.

JD: James Harrison is the Man With The Golden Arm. We reached him in Gosford, Australia.

[Music: Ambient Tones]

Humboldt GoFundMe

JD: On April 6^th 16 people were killed in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash. And as grief and condolences poured into the community from around the world, so did donations. More than 15 million dollars was raised through a GoFundMe for the families affected by the crash — the 16 killed and 13 injured. And today at a press conference in Regina, Humboldt Broncos President Kevin Garinger laid out some of the next steps in the distribution process. Saskatchewan is actually the only jurisdiction in Canada with legislation that governs how funds like these should be distributed. A judge will be appointed to oversee the dissemination of the money. Scott Thomas was also at the press conference. His son Evan died in the crash. Here's part of what Mr. Thomas had to say.

SOUNDCLIP

SCOTT THOMAS: Right from the beginning the Humboldt Broncos have been there for us. The billet families, they've provided a platform for us to communicate. And I would think that it's very fair to say that through our WhatsApp group that all 29 of us communicate daily. So we’re in constant communication with each other, we’re in constant communication with the Broncos, and right from the start we've had full confidence that the Broncos are doing everything they can that's in the best interest of all 29 of us. They've indicated right from the start that this is a monumental task, this is almost unprecedented in the world — let alone in Saskatchewan and this has been thrown at their feet. And we've known rates from beginning that they would do everything that they can to make sure that we're all treated fairly and consistently through this and so far they've been good that way. We have absolutely no doubt that 100 per cent of these funds are going to find their way to the to the 29 families that were on the bus, that they are going to be used for exactly what they intended for. Anybody that's involved in this process is a volunteer or has donated their services, we know that for a fact. On so many levels, by so many people from all over the world, our families have been reached out to and supported in so many ways. So if there's people out there that are concerned that this has taken a long time, this is only six weeks. I picked my son up from the funeral home yesterday, my cremated son, and we divided his ashes up in a 10 little urn so his friends and family could have some pieces of him. Not at one point, I can honestly say, has the word GoFundMe ever came up. This is the stuff that our families are dealing with right now. We're patient, we're secure, and we're confident and we support the Broncos and everything that they're doing. So thank you very much.

JD: That was Scott Thomas speaking at a press conference in Regina earlier today. His son Evan was one of the 16 people who died in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash on April 6^th.

[Music: Oboes]

Dennis Franklin Cromarty High School Graduation

JD: After a number of tragic endings, a different one — a triumphant one. A Thunder Bay High School has been at the centre of a controversy brought to light by Anishinaabe journalist Tanya Talaga. Six of the seven Indigenous students whose deaths Ms. Talaga investigates in her book Seven Fallen Feathers attended Dennis Franklin Cromarty High School in Thunder Bay. They were far from home, far from their families, far from the lives that they had known. This week however DFC High was home to a good news story — the graduation of 24 Indigenous students, including a class valedictorian Tanisha Chikane.

SOUNDCLIP

TANISHA CHIKANE: When I first came to DFC I didn't know what to expect. I was 14-years-old and full of emotions. Emotions such as excitement, anxiety, fear and happiness. Excitement because I was leaving the reserve, the only place I've ever really known. I was going to meet new people, try new things and live in a different city. Anxious because I was worried about how I'd do in school on my assignments and such. I also felt fear because Thunder Bay was a new and unknown city to me. Last, but not least, happiness because it gave me pride and joy to be attending high school and furthering my education. The excitement and happiness quickly faded and other feelings grew as time went on. So here we are about to take our first steps into the adult world. I know we great because we’ve become strong individuals who have been through a lot to make it on this stage today. It has been rough but being around everyone and being a First Nations person gives me such motivation to do the best I can at all I do. I know my peers feel the same way as wanting to better themselves. So all in all this is the ending to our high school chapter. Let's make the next one great as well. Since our new chapter is unknown for the most part, nevertheless remember what Nora Roberts said whenever you’re thinking about what to do next in life. If you don't go after what you want you'll never have it. If you don't step forward you'll always be in the same place. Thank you very much and congratulations to DFC class of 2018.

[APPLAUSE & CHEERING]

JD: Tanisha Chikane is a senior graduating from Dennis Franklin Cromarty High School in Thunder Bay this year. The school previously taught six of the seven Indigenous youth whose deaths are the focus of Anishinaabe journalist Tanya Talaga’s book Seven Fallen Feathers. The tape of Ms. Chikane is courtesy of APTN.

[Music: Trance Bass]

Tommy’s Barber Shop

Guest: Thong Luong

JD: Tommy Gun’s is taking aim at a small target. Tommy Guns is a national Barbershop chain that promises to quote “Reacquaint you with your manly awesomeness.” Tommy's Barbershop in Dartmouth Nova Scotia has no slogan. It also has no website and it has no gun in the name. And yet Tommy Gun’s has sent the owner of Tommy's Barbershop a cease-and-desist letter claiming trademark infringement. The barber shop owner in question is Thong Luong. And he says he is sticking to his guns. We reached Mr. Luong in Dartmouth.

CO: Thong, how is business today?

THONG LUONG: Our business is doing really good today. I got a lot of phone calls from different people from everywhere in Canada.

CO: Are they to get a haircut or to talk to you?

TL: They give me support, tell me how nice it is that I can stand up to fight back with the big company.

CO: Now the big company is this Tommy Gun’s barbershops, which has issued you a cease-and-desist letter. Their lawyers have told you cannot call your shop Tommy’s anymore?

TL: Yes, yes by the 22^nd of this month, I have to take my name now and I have to register with the government in Nova Scotia.

CO: What reasons are they giving that you can't use their your name?

TL: Because they said my name is confusing with their business because they have Tommy Gun’s across Canada for several years. But they were six years behind me.

CO: You had the name first?

TL: I had the name first and now they tell me I have to take my name down.

CO: Now this is a different name, isn’t it? Tommy’s Barbershop is not the same.

TL: It's different, totally different name. I am Tommy’s Barbershop and their name is Tommy Gun’s Original Barbeshop. So that’d two different names.

CO: But now you say you've had this name since 2003?

TL: Yes, yes.

CO: And they came along in 2009?

TL: Yes. And they opened two shops — one in Mic Mac Mall in Dartmouth three years ago, and one in Bedford last year. And now they told me that I interfere with their business so they want to tell me that I have to change the name or they will do take me to court. They want to sue me.

CO: But so Tommy Gun’s they have 70 locations across Canada, but this is the first you've heard that they don't want you to call your barbershop Tommy’s?

TL: Yes, yes. And customers are used to my name Tommy, and children always call me Tommy because they like me everywhere I go. Customers meet me and say “Hi Tommy.” So kids love my name. And even my daughter called me from P.E.I. today and she cried. She said “Dad, they’re suing you now, you better change your name.”

CO: Your name Thing Luong, why did you call your shop Tommy’s?

TL: Two reasons. My name is Thong, T-H-O-N-G, but a lot of Canadians can’t pronounce my name Thong. And the second thing, ever since they come to Canada a lot people call me Tom,. So I think that name is good, sp I made my name Tommy’s Barbershop.

CO: You just mentioned that you came to Canada. When did you come to Canada?

TL: I came to Canada in January 1984. I came from Vietnam.

CO: What did you do before you opened your barber shop?

TL: I used to go to school, go to high school. And after that I became a dishwasher. I worked in a kitchen, cleaning a shopping mall, and security guard and I fixed jewelry. And then I worked 90 hours a week for 14 years straight. And then after that I became a barber. I went to barber school and become a barber. And I work here seven days a week for the last 15 years.

CO: How many kids do you have?

TL: I have three kids — a 17-year-old girl, a 14-years-old girl and a 12-year-old boy.

CO: What are your kids saying about this, not being able to you use the name?

TL: My two girls were shocked and the little guy was crying. Because he thinks that it's not fair for daddy.

CO: What do you say to your kids when they're so upset?

TL: I said “Don't worry. It’s not only daddy who’s fighting for this. There are a lot of good people out there supporting daddy. And there is a lot people calling me today.

CO: And what are you hearing? Because of all the people talking about this happening to you, is that changing the Tommy Gun’s are they backing down?

TL: I don't know. I hope they do. To me, this is not for a small guy. I’m just surviving, making a living. They’re a big company and they’re trying to walk all over a small business guy. And I will not give up anything for anybody like that.

CO: You work so hard, the story you tell of just how many jobs you worked trying to raise your family. First of all, working as a dishwasher and then all the way to lead to this moment when your barbershop has to change its name because of this big company. What does that say to you about Canada?

TL: Canada is a beautiful country but only a greedy company like that would try to upset people like that. But to me, only one letter came from them, but I got a hundred different comments about me. So I don't worry about that.

CO: Sounds like your customers, your clients, are still really loyal to you then?

TL: Yes they do. You know I find that in Canada is if you stand for your rights and you did the right thing nobody can put you down.

CO: Well, Thong, I hope you're right about that and I hope you get to keep your name and I really appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

TL: You're welcome. And thank you for everything. You have good day. As long as I can stand here, I will keep my name.

CO: OK, we'll watch. Thanks so much.

TL: Thank you.

CO: Bye.

JD: Thong Luong is the owner of Tommy's Barbershop in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia and that is where we reached him.

[Music: Banjo]

Part 3: Former Israel Defence Force soldier, New Rembrandt, CFC mystery

Former Israel Defence Force soldier

Guest: Avner Gvaryahu

JD: The International spokesman of the Israel Defense Forces says Hamas won a huge PR victory after Monday's violence at the Israel Gaza fence. Today, Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus said quote “Hamas wanted the casualties. Hamas wanted people to die. Hamas wanted the pictures of the wounded and the overflowing hospitals,” unquote. The Lieutenant Colonel also said he believes IDF soldiers did their job with discipline and professionalism. Avner Gvaryahu used to be an IDF soldier. Now he serves as the executive director of Breaking The Silence. That's a group of Israeli veterans who speak openly and critically about their experience within IDF. We reached Mr. Gvaryahu in Tel Aviv.

CO: Mr. Gvaryahu, what were you thinking as you watched what unfolded on Monday at the Israel-Gaza fence?

AVNER GVARYAHU: It was shameful, shameful for what my country was doing. And as a former paratrooper, as a sergeant of the snipers team, I was thinking that we must have better ways to disperse demonstrations like the ones we saw on Monday.

CO: I want to ask you a bit more about that. But first of all, can you describe the situation? What is the area that is being protected by the Israeli defense forces on Monday?

AG: So I didn't serve as a soldier on the Gaza border, or in the strip itself, but from what I know there is not a wall there but a fence. And there in some places double or triple fences. And inside the strip itself there's actually a 100 to 300 metre buffer zone that the military declared. And that is an area, that we know from previous testimonies, when Palestinians enter they are risking their lives. And basically a lot of the protests were around that area, maybe a little bit deeper into the strip.

CO: This is what's called the ‘No Entry Zone’ and Palestinians, they had leaflets dropped to tell people, to warn them not to come near the fence, and if they did that there would be consequences. Do you know how close they would be considered to be dangerous for them to get to that fence?

AG: Well, I think that's one of the things that’s unclear. You know, that's one of the key issues, that it's a one-sided decision. But I would take that a step further. It doesn't compute for me the fact that someone steps into a specific area inside the strip deemed him a legitimate target. The only reason to shoot someone and to maim him or take his life, is if that shooting could save someone else's life. If that's not the equation then we have a problem. If there are only felony was walking into a zone that Israel one-sidedly declared they cannot walk into, that is not something that I see as legitimate or moral or even something that abides with military regulations as we know them.

CO: But I want to put to you what we learned on Tuesday's program from Michael Oren, who is a deputy minister to Prime Minister Netanyahu, who said that what they were dealing with was an operation that was organized by Hamas. Hamas is regarded by your country, and by mine, to be a terrorist organization that has said that it's dedicated to the destruction of Israel, and that they believed that this was, this forty or fifty thousand people that were there were organized by Hamas and that there were Hamas operatives within those ranks who were trying to breach the fence and to get into Israel where they might hurt and harm people. So what we heard from Mr. Oren is that they had to protect that fence and they had to shoot people to do that. What do you say to him?

AG: You know, it's just absurd to me that an Israeli official, regardless of where he is and his position, only response is ‘They're at fault for us killing them.’ The situation in the strip is a direct outcome of the lack of any action on the Israeli government — on either front — in the West Bank or in the Gaza Strip. But I have no pleasant things to say about Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist organization and Israel has the right to defend itself. But if some of the people that were killed were Hamas members, that is not the relevant question. The relevant question is: Were the people killed posing a direct threat to the soldiers or to Israeli citizens?

CO: We heard from Mr. Oren and from others that Hamas units that were within those large numbers, were attempting to plant explosives on defense. They had grenades they said, they had some of them had firearms.

AG: But there are different tools that you could use that don't amount to lethal weapons. We knew this was coming weeks ago. I don't buy that the best thing we could do happened on Monday because the outcome is horrific.

CO: But we heard a senior Hamas official interviewed this week on Palestinian TV and said that the majority of those who were killed — 50 of them he said, were members of Hamas.

AG: I'll be very surprised to learn that the snipers sat on the fence with pictures of specific Hamas operatives. And there is attempts by Hamas to show that most of their casualties are theirs. The other side of that coin is also Israel saying most of them are Hamas members. But at the end of the day the only test that is relevant in this discussion is did they pose a direct threat to someone's life?

CO: Just finally, you are part of this — well you’re executive director of ‘Breaking The Silence.’ And that's an organization that encourages IDF soldiers to come and tell what they have gone to through, through private testimony. You've put an ad out asking for soldiers who were there on Monday to do that. Have you had any response to your ad?

AG: So, I will choose not to answer that at this point. I would say this. It is very clear to me that the soldiers that shot people who were unarmed are going to remember that. And that is something that's going to stay with them. And I hope that there will be enough soldiers that will come out in order to say that this should end. And obviously these high prices paid by the Palestinians and by the Israelis is something that we hope will end.

CO: Mr. Gvaryahu, I appreciate speaking with you, thank you.

AG: Thank you very much.

JD: Avner Gvaryahu is a former IDF paratrooper and Sergeant. He now serves as the executive director of Breaking The Silence. That is a group which publishes testimonies of Israeli veterans who have served within the IDF. Since Monday's violence at the Israel-Gaza fence, Hamas has responded to defend their leadership in Gaza. And today Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, released a video statement on his Facebook page addressing those claims by Hamas. Here is what he said.

SOUNDCLIP

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: Ready for a real shocker? I completely agree with the leaders of the Hamas terrorist organization who've said this over the past few days. Mahmoud al-Zahar, a co-founder of Hamas, said that calling the actions of Palestinians on the Gaza border peaceful is a clear deception. This is not a peaceful resistance, he said. I agree. Shooting guns and lobbing explosives at Israelis isn't peaceful at all. Well, how about senior Hamas official Salah Bardawil, he said that 50 out of the 60 Palestinians killed Monday were members of Hamas, members of a terrorist organization. The same Hamas that has called for genocide of every single Jew. This is what we're defending our families against. And you would do exactly the same.

JD: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressing his Facebook followers in a video released today.

[Music: Somber Tones]

Winnipeg Letter Bomb verdict

JD: Guido Amsel has been found guilty of four out of five counts of attempted murder in a Winnipeg mail bombing case. Mr. Amsel was accused of sending letter bombs to his ex-wife's home and to two law firms — first in 2013 and again in 2015. Two of the bombs in 2015 were safely detonated by police. But a third went off in the hands of Maria Mitousis, a lawyer representing Mr. Amsel’s ex-wife Iris Amsel in divorce proceedings. Ms. Mitousis has lost her right hand and suffered serious burns as a result. During her verdict today Judge Tracey Lord said that there is no disputing that Mr. Amsel was behind the bombing.

SOUNDCLIP

JUDGE TRACEY LORD: The similarities are so numerous and unique that I'm satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the same individual sent all three explosive devices, and that the probability of these incidents occurring independently of one another, by coincidence, is non-existent. I have concluded that the person who sent the devices was Mr. Amsel.

JD: Manitoba Judge Tracey Lord convicted Guido Amsel of four counts of attempted murder today. Winnipeg lawyer Maria Mitousis lost her right hand to one of Mr. Amsel’s letter bombs. She spoke with this program during her recovery in 2016.

SOUNDCLIP

MARIA MITOUSIS: I remember it. I knew it was an explosion — the sound and just the way that I reacted. But I remember thinking to myself that this doesn't happen here. How could this happen here? How is this possible? I knew I needed help right away. That's the first thing. I was in my office but it was an ordinary workday so my colleagues were just outside their offices. I knew that I had to get out of my office. They had already heard the sound and when I was able to, I opened the door of my office and walked out of it. They were already on the phone with 911 and that was something that was I was very aware of — that they were already taking care of things. Connie, my colleague, she had already been running down the hallway towards my office when I was able to open the door and so I felt immediately that we were figuring it out, you know.

LAURA LYNCH: This is remarkable though, because you had sustained very serious injuries, you essentially lost your right hand. How were you able to do this, to open doors to be talking to people?

MM: I immediately remember that I had my arms across my stomach. I knew somehow that I had to keep my arm pressed into my stomach. I remember that feeling of trying to keep myself together. I don't think I consciously knew that I was missing — my hand was injured, my arm was injured but because I didn't know the extent of my injuries it was a very conscious effort on my part just to not panic.

JD: That was a Winnipeg lawyer Maria Mitousis speaking with As It Happens guest host Laura Lynch in 2016. Again, Ms. Mitousis lost her right hand to a letter bomb sent to her office by Guido Amsel in 2015. Today Mr. Amsel was convicted of four counts of attempted murder in a Manitoba Court.

[Music: Guitar Plucks]

New Rembrandt

Guest: Jan Six

JD: You might think that all of the paintings by the old masters were known by now. After all, people have been admiring and collecting their works for 400 years. But this week, a Dutch art dealer announced that he believes he has discovered a heretofore unknown Rembrandt. The painting is known as ‘Portrait of a Young Gentleman’ and Jan Six bought it at an auction in 2016. And since that time he has been gathering evidence to support his claim that it is in fact a Rembrandt. And he has published a book to back up his case. We reached Jan Six in Amsterdam.

CO: Mr. Six, when and how did this painting first catch your eye?

JAN SIX: Well, the auction house Christie's in London sent a catalogue to my gallery and as usual I just flipped through it and then I saw this Portrait of a Young Man and they called it Circle of Rembrandts.

CO: What does that mean circle of Rembrandt?

JS: Well, it means somebody in the in the close surrounding of Rembrandt.

CO: One of his apprentices or students or something like that was the circle?

JS: It could be, but it could also be somebody that just lives in Amsterdam and paints in a different style. And I felt it really looks like Rembrandt and if you just look at the fashion that the young man is wearing you can see it from the early 30s and Rembrandt just came to Amsterdam in the early 30s. So I thought ‘Hang on, he’s just new in Amsterdam, he doesn't have a circle.’ And then I got really excited because that means that either it's some sort of fake or it's the real deal.

CO: Again, but you're dealing with a picture, a photo in the catalogue?

JS: Yeah.

CO: Where did you take it next in order to see if — to test your theory that perhaps this was something quite extraordinary?

JS: Well, what I did is that I printed out the image from the site and the great professor of Rembrandt paintings, Professor van de Wetering, he lives in Amsterdam quite nearby, so I actually took the prints went on my bicycle to his house. I asked ‘Can I show you a digital reproduction of a painting?’ And he said “This is actually quite promising.” And then I said “Do you think it could be by Rembrandt?” And he said “Well, why not?” And I got really excited.

CO: But this painting is for sale?

JS: So yes, I got really excited and I decided, you know, this is a very good reason to fly to London and to see the painting for real and then make up my mind. So I went to London, went to the auction house, stood in front of the picture and I was absolutely amazed. So I took many photographs of details and then I went to the National Gallery, which is very close by. And at that museum they had a wonderful portrait done by Rembrandt with the same type of rough colour, lace colour, and the similarities were so astonishing that I thought ‘This is right. If that picture is by Rembrandt, this picture must be by Rembrandt. And then the auction started and we were actually quite lucky because it didn't fetch the Rembrandt price, it actually fetched an agreeable price. It was 140,000 pounds, which is still a lot of money. But it's not a lot of money for a Rembrandt.

CO: But you still needed to verify this, right?

JS: Well, to be honest, I was at that very moment in an even worse situation because there I bought the picture for 140,000, which is a Rembrandt price, which was not signed, not dated and wasn't published in the literature. So at that moment the real adventure started. First we cleaned the picture, we took all sorts of photographs, X-ray, infrared, ultraviolet. And then we compared it to a great painting in the and the the technical outcome of all this research was that these pictures were all virtually the same, the same buildups, same pigment, same material, same way of painting, same technical solutions within the composition. And then I felt confident to show to many other experts. In the end I showed it to 15 different specialists in the field that all have published on Rembrandt and they all agree that it was a painting by Rembrandt.

CO: I mean, because this is radio we can't be showing it, but I've seen pictures and I've seen video of it, obviously, the cleaned up version, it's just luminous, it's beautiful. Can you describe what it looks like?

JS: A young man, he has a sort of a red fluffy her hairdo, and he has a wonderful white lace ruff on a black suit with a velvet cape. On his left hand he wears a grayish glove.

CO: Right. At this point, I mean, even with all the people who are saying that you've consulted, it still is a theory, right. So how do you get it declared bonafide Rembrandt?

JS: You try to get a consensus, which means that you talk to many experts in the field and you try to combine the connoisseurial ideas of all these experts with all the technical evidence that you take by conducting tests. And in the end it is about accepting it because the real truth is very hard to find. I mean, we weren't present when Rembrandt painted these paintings. He didn't keep ledger with all the paintings that he painted.

CO: Well you weren't present when he painted these paintings but a member of your family was present. Your ancestor was painted by — Jan Six is your name, the same name as a painting of Rembrandt

JS: The first Jan Six, I am the eleventh Jan Six. And his portrait, painted by Rembrandt always remained in the family. And as a child I grew up looking at that picture.

CO: Maybe it was destined to be?

JS: Well, you know, I try not to say that because in the end of the day to really discover a picture of government you do need to work a lot to understand what the painter did and you read a lot and talk a lot to understand a lot about it. And it's not as simple as just growing up in a collection of paintings, it takes a bit more.

CO: All right, well we leave it there. Mr. Six thank you for speaking with us.

JS: Yes, my pleasure.

JD: Jan Six is an art dealer and we reached him in Amsterdam. His new book backing up his claim that this painting is genuine is called Rembrandt’s Portrait of a Young Gentleman.

Coyote Attack

JD: He needed 148 stitches. But three-year-old Ayden Ramm is recovering at home after being attacked by a coyote in Burnaby, British Columbia. It was the first of two separate coyote attacks in the Vancouver area within 24 hours. Ayden’s mom, Amanda Dycke described the mauling which occurred just outside their back gate.

AMANDA DYCKE: I got out to the front door I heard the scream. Just that — you know you're in trouble oh my goodness scream. But I couldn't see so I ran to the sidewalk and I seen the coyote on his head chewing on his head trying to — and all I could do is do what I've always been taught. Make noise try to seem bigger and badder than them. And he wasn't leaving and my instinct was to just charge full speed ahead to get it away and it didn't leave but it backed up enough I scooped up my son and I started running screaming “Help, help, help.” And he came he scooped him up we got all the kids inside. We left the gate open but we shut the door and the coyote followed us. He had come into the backyard but we had come to the front door to scream for any neighbours that could help. I was on the phone with 911 right away. A couple of neighbours had finally come out, the coyote was still going back and forth around the front of our area here, and he didn't leave for about five to ten minutes after the incident, this coyote. Even though there was there was about five six people to start and by the time there was about ten or more people it finally left like okay maybe this wasn't worth it, but its mouth was dripping in my son's blood. My son — we didn't know where the injuries were first. He was just covered from head to toe in blood. His eyes were like he couldn't blink — it looked like he was crying blood. I was on the phone with the ambulance until they got here. The neighbour helped control the bleeding. They were giving me directions. I couldn't see what was going on. So as a mother I was panicked. The neighbour didn't — she knew what was underneath but she wouldn't show us because she was like “You have to wait till they get here, because if I let it go it is going to bleed everywhere.”

JD: That was Amanda Dycke in Burnaby, British Columbia. Her three-year-old son Ayden required nearly 150 stitches. He is now thankfully recovering at home.

CFC mystery

Guest: Stephen Montzka

JD: 30 years ago countries around the world agreed to stop producing ozone layer destroying chlorofluorocarbons — CFCs. The results were dramatic. It was considered a climate change success story. But in recent years scientists have detected a mysterious rise in levels of CFC in the atmosphere despite the worldwide ban. And that means that someone somewhere is still making the chemical. Now scientists are trying to find out who. Stephen Montzka is a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. We reached him in Boulder, Colorado.

CO: Mr. Montzka, what did you think when you first notice that these quantities of CFCs were still entering the atmosphere?

STEPHEN MONTZKA: I was really surprised at the quantities of emissions that I was seeing increasing in the atmosphere for CFC 11, given that its production has been phased out for nearly a decade.

CO: What are your theories when you first notice this as to why it was happening?

SM: It could have been that the process by which the atmosphere removes naturally CFC 11 had changed. We investigated that found that it might play some role but can explain everything. That left, in fact, an emission increase and then it came to try to understand what we could about where that emission might be happening from. And we were able to isolate it to, we think, Eastern Asia.

CO: It's like you’re being a detective trying to find something like this. How difficult was it to actually pinpoint it to an actual region of the earth?

SM: You know, I think it is very akin to a detective story. We gather evidence, we use other information and try to put all that together. We make measurements downwind of Eastern Asia, we make measurements about a dozen different locations around the world. And the ones downwind of East Asia in Hawaii showed, after 2012 and into 2013 and in subsequent years, increases in concentration of CFC 11 when the winds were clearly coming from, or the air was clearly transporting emissions from this region. So Moanalua, the Hawaiian site, is impacted by emissions from that region in the summertime in particular. And so we see increases in emissions of many different gases from that region in the samples that we collect at Moanalua.

CO: Well what do you think that they're doing in eastern Asia is producing CFC at this rate?

SM: That's a big puzzle, too, and it's really a puzzle that we don't have a lot of information about. CFC 11 exists in large quantities around the world. We can't imagine that that's causing all of what we've seen. So instead maybe there's some production that's happening but why and how we're not sure. I mean, there are tons of chemicals produced from the fluorination and chlorination of methane worldwide, including in East Asia. And you could produce some CFC 11 from that process. It's really hard to imagine that somebody is producing CFT 11 for use in foams today, since we thought everybody had phased out that use years ago. Why would somebody want to try and start or go back to using a chemical that they had phased out years ago?

CO: So I'm old enough to remember the Montreal Protocol and what an accomplishment that was when the world decided to act together and ban these CFCs. And so how much changed? What did people do for this chemical after they were compelled to ban it?

SM: Well, there have been substitutes in place for a number of years. And so presumably those substitutes have been used. The concentration of ozone depleting gases continues to decrease in the atmosphere, it’s just decreasing a little less rapidly than we would hope.

CO: But then people have used other things as other products to make our air conditioners and our fridges work and to make foam suits and everything. So going back to this mystery source of CFC, was it something that they're making? Could it be destroying buildings that are full CFCs and maybe they're being released into the atmosphere? I mean, what are the other explanations?

SM: Yeah, I mean, we'd expect some increase in CFC 11 emissions because of buildings that were built years ago are destroyed in the atmosphere. But to imagine it happening in a way that would ultimately double the release rate of CFC 11 from that reservoir and that global reservoir of foams and buildings and in fridge insulation, it's just hard to imagine.

CO: And meanwhile because we know that the reason why these have to be banned was because of the destruction of the ozone layer. What are the implications for the ozone layer? Is it going to continue to deplete that if you can't slow this down?

SM: You know there's still a substantial amount of ozone depleting substances in the in the atmosphere. Their concentration overall decreases quite slowly because these chemicals are long lived. Fortunately, we have a measurement system in place currently that is fairly sensitive to small changes in emission rates. So we think we've caught this quite early. So before it's gotten substantially worrisome or substantial — before it's influenced ozone substantially. The problem would be if it were to continue into the future then then we might be dealing with more substantial ozone depletion. We estimate that if these emissions were to be sustained in the future that maybe the ozone recovery would be delayed by approximately a decade.

CO: Well I appreciate your detective work. I guess you still have to keep wearing that detective hat while you find out where it's coming from. Mr. Montzka, thank you.

SM: Thank you.

JD: Stephen Montzka is a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. We reached him in Boulder, Colorado.

May 18, 2018 episode transcript

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