BARTLETT COVE, AK – On June 25, 2014, Alaska's Glacier Bay National Park will celebrate the grand opening of "Snow" -- an exhibit of the largest humpback whale skeleton on display in the United States. Snow's life was cut short in 2001, when she was struck and killed as she tried to cross the path of a cruise ship leaving Glacier Bay. The cruise line accepted responsibility for the collision, and the skeleton exhibit was funded, in part, from the 2006 legal settlement funds held in trust by the National Park Foundation.
The National Park Service constructed an open-sided outdoor pavilion to house the display. Cleaning and preparing the bones took over 1,000 hours of work by Park staff and volunteers, followed by the expertise of a professional whale articulation contractor. There are 161 bones in all, which weigh 3,729 pounds, not including the steel and other structural elements which now hold the skeleton together. The exhibit itself is a work of art, magnificent for its sheer size and the graceful pose that suggests that the whale is in motion.
Join us in Bartlett Cove for a series of events to celebrate the completion of this dramatic exhibit and the return of "Snow:"
Tuesday, June 24th 7:00 pm Special Evening Presentation Glacier Bay Lodge Theater "3-D Scanning Whale Bones, and Digitizing the World's Whales" by Herb Maschner, Idaho Virtualization Laboratory
Wednesday, June 25th at the Whale Exhibit 2:00-4:00 pm Children's Activities and Whale Fun 4:00-5:00 pm Grand Opening/Ribbon Cutting 5:00-5:30 pm T'akdeintaan Blessing by the Hoonah Indian Association
7:00 pm Special Evening Presentation Glacier Bay Lodge Theater "Putting Snow's Bones Back Together" Dan DenDanto, Whale and Nails
To view "Snow" up-close and personal, and discover how large humpback whales really are, visit Bartlett Cove in Glacier Bay National Park. The whale exhibit is easily accessible along the shoreline trail in front of Glacier Bay Lodge.
