My friends and I sometimes went fishing in Blinn Lake, about halfway between the radar site and the town of Cold Bay. The only fish my friends and I caught in the area lakes were Dolly Varden, which were quite tasty. Out in Blinn Lake was a small island with pretty typical features for that part of Alaska. The island had no trees, nor cover of any sort.

BEAR STORY

One weekend, two of the airmen from our site went to Blinn Lake to fish and camp. They rowed a small boat out to the island, pitched camp, and eventually crawled into their sleeping bags for the night. Now, camping for us was different from the usual tent camping done back in the lower forty-eight(states). We spread our sleeping bags on the ground, protecting ourselves from the elements with only a waterproof sleeping bag cover. We did not use tents. Anyway, the two guys got into their bags at about dusk, ready to turn in for the night. Now, Blinn Lake was in the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, home to some of the largest bears on Earth. Those were the same species as the better-known Kodiak and Grizzly. Needless to say, we all were aware of the Alaskan Brown Bears, and were always alert to the possibility of their presence. The two airmen were no exception.
As they were starting to doze off, one of the men looked out onto the lake and saw four objects swimming through the water toward the island. Instantly, the groggy camper was alert and cried out to his friend that there were four bears swimming toward them! He climbed out of his bag, and had started toward the boat when his friend cried out that he couldn’t get his sleeping bag open. The zipper was stuck! Running back to his campmate, the airman worked at the zipper until it came free. Both campers ran for their rowboat, jumped in, and made for shore as hard as they could. By now it was dark, and, for sure, night was not a good time to be in the same neighborhood with those monstrous bears. Arriving on shore, the two men ran up a slope to a grouping of small Federal Aviation Administration buildings. All of the doors were locked, so they climbed up to one of the roofs, where they spent the rest of the night. The next day, the two made it back to the site none the worse for wear. When we heard the story, it was told in such a comical way that the rest of us enjoyed a good laugh.