Life in Polar Bear Town with Gordon Buchanan

'Every autumn on the edge of the Arctic,

'polar bears gather to wait for the sea ice to freeze.'

'And for a few weeks, they outnumber people

'in the tiny town of Churchill.'

This is the start of a traffic jam here.

'For tourists, it's a chance to see these Arctic icons first hand.'

Any closer, I'm going to get into the car.

'But living alongside one of the world's biggest carnivores,

'you can never let down your guard.'

The bear's jaw was on my head,

I could feel that he was ripping my scalp off.

'To keep things under control,

'the authorities have resorted to some interesting techniques.'

Now that is something you don't see every day.

'As a wildlife cameraman, I'm used to spending time

'with these beautiful creatures out in the wild.'

There's a majesty to them that is unrivalled.

'But life in the polar bear capital of the world...'

Um, maybe start the engine, Freddie.

'..is going to be a different challenge altogether.'

OK, that's enough.

'It's late October and the start of Churchill's bear season.

'My plane is packed with tourists

'all eager for their first polar bear sighting.'

'I'm hoping to beat them to it.'

'So on my way into town, I get the latest from my cabbie, Lawrence.'

So when was the last bear spotted in town?

Wednesday, they scared it out on the south end of town,

they scared it across the river.

See this open area?

There's always a bear around here, I don't know why.

It seems a very unlikely place to see polar bears.

Well, they were here before us.

'Churchill is a small town in the Canadian province of Manitoba,

'perched on the edge of Hudson Bay.

'It began life as a trading and military outpost,

'and today, it retains that frontier feel.

'There's nothing for hundreds of miles in any direction.

'And the only way in is by air or a two-day train journey.'

Ordinarily, a town like this

would just be somewhere that I was transiting

through on my way to some remote place to find some exotic creature,

but this time, the town of Churchill is my destination.

700 people live in the town year-round

and up to 1,000 polar bears migrate through this area,

some of them directly through the town.

'Churchill is right on the edge of the Arctic,

'but its location on the shores of Hudson Bay

'makes it a haven for polar bears.

'Each winter, the bay freezes over and the bears head out

'onto the sea ice to hunt.

'Bears use the ice as a platform to access their favourite

'blubber-rich meal - ringed seals.

'When the ice melts in spring, the feast is over

'and the bears return to shore.'

'But the Arctic is warming faster than anywhere else on earth,

'and the sea ice they depend on is slowly disappearing.

'In late October, the temperature is beginning to fall.

'There's no sign of the ice just yet, but the bears have arrived.'

Are we going up that way?

We can take the next one if you want.

'Local guide Dennis Compayre is going to help me find them.'

I've heard of Churchill, I've seen the images and the footage of bears

in the town, but now that I'm here,

I'm really struggling to just picture

these animals in somewhere like this.

Yeah. It really is a double take when you see a bear

walking down the road, just nonchalantly.

It's pretty bizarre.

-How long have you been here?

-I was born and raised here.

When I was a kid, my only nightmare was a polar bear.

GORDON LAUGHS

In the dead of winter in Churchill, it's crazy, man,

when you get these banshee winds all night and these crazy scrapings

on your wall, you figure, "That's it, I'm a goner."

So, as a kid, you're terrified.

So we're heading now this way, we're going to go this way,

they call it Polar Bear Alley.

GORDON LAUGHS

Let's hope it lives up to its name.

So, here is a good sign that there's something going on here.

Oh, there you go.

-Right over there.

-Let's go and have a look at this guy.

Right.

It's very relaxed.

Not worrying at all.

Just kind of picking her way through the grass.

It's just exquisite, it really is.

And we've got - hang on - one, two, three, four,

five, six, seven, eight, nine - nine vehicles.

Is this a usual kind of...?

That's resources there. They're going to chase the bear away.

'In Churchill, a team of conservation officers

'is responsible for keeping people safe.

'They've decided to try and turn this bear around,

'before it gets any closer to town.'

See, I'd be inclined just to kind of let it go wherever it wants.

Certainly.

Even if that's straight through the middle of town.

-Hey, Dennis.

-How are you doing?

-What you want us to do?

-Just get in your vehicle there.

OK? Thank you.

Get in the vehicle.

It seems a bit of a shame, because we've found this polar bear

and we're getting some nice shots

and we've got to get into the vehicle

because the resourcers are going to chase it away.

Oh, well.

HE LAUGHS

'In Churchill, unsurprisingly,

'the conservation officers are well armed.'

This guy is going to get it right now.

GUNSHOT

'Firing blanks in the air is usually an effective way

'of moving a bear on.'

GUNSHOT ECHOES

She's got the message.

You know, having spent a bit of time with polar bears before,

I thought there was no threat here, this is a polar bear aware of us,

sort of cautious, but absolutely not acting aggressively whatsoever.

So, I feel a little bit sorry for the bear,

because there was an aggressive act coming back at it

for just minding its own business.

This place is interesting,

because you've got two of the world's most dangerous creatures

as neighbours - humans and polar bears.

I know the ones that I trust more.

It's the big furry white ones.

Thank you for that.

You showed me my first Churchill bear.

-That was the first bear, wasn't it?

-Yeah!

DENNIS CHUCKLES

'These bears haven't had a proper meal for months,

'and with the weather still too warm for the bay to freeze,

'it's all about conserving energy.'

'The roads here are full of tourists,

'looking for the next photo opportunity.

'As am I.'

That's kind of pretty, eh?

The start of a traffic jam here.

For me, actually, seeing a polar bear in the company of what?

Maybe 30 people...

It's very strange. It's kind of a little bit of a circus

with the bears right at the heart of it.

It's coming back. Any closer and I'm going to get into the car.

It's definitely being affected by what's going on here,

because one moment it's walking to my left,

and then it stops and turns around.

I get the feeling that it would prefer

that none of us were here.

Film away if you must.

Yeah, all he wanted to do was cross the road, isn't it?

I feel sorry for the bears, because bears have got their own agenda,

they want to sort of do their own thing and it seems that human beings

are standing in their way, whether that is conservation officers

waiting to take action, whether that's polar bear tourists...

But then in saying that, these vehicles may be full of people

whose lifetime ambition is to come and see a polar bear,

they've paid a lot of money to come up here to see one, and right now,

there might be someone in one of those cars,

having fulfilled that dream.

'Thousands of tourists come to Churchill every year,

'and if they're lucky, they'll see a bear near town.'

'But the closest they'll get to a guaranteed sighting is a tour

'of the Wildlife Management Area to the east of town.

'A nature reserve where the bears can roam free.'

'Tourists travel into the wilderness in style.'

'The enormous buggies are raised up on huge off-road tyres,'

'giving a great view

'and keeping the windows out of reach of curious bears.

'My driver today is Marcus Petak.'

I am obsessed by this vehicle.

-Impressive, isn't it?

-So did it kind of start off as a bit of

-a Frankenstein buggy to begin with?

-It did, it did.

It was a group of friends in the late '70s that wanted to view bears

safely and they're manufactured here in Churchill.

You are seeing people achieving a lifetime ambition.

No doubt, yeah. Lots and lots of our visitors,

they have that bucket list location destination, and we get to bring out

people who are really late in life, some of them are ill,

if you can imagine, and this is something

they've always wanted to do. That's pretty magic.

-There's one there, is it?

-Can you see a bear ahead?

I think you just spotted one, Gordon.

I'm going to pull up as close as we can here and see what we've got.

Take a look at this little juvenile.

So this is about a four or five-year-old, I would say,

but a very healthy-looking bear.

Oh, wow!

It's great to see this bear, but the actual response from everyone,

as soon as you saw it, everyone is like "Oh!"

and you hear that excitement.

Thousands of people,

they visit us over the course of the season from all over the world

and they learn about, you know, this environment,

they learn about that animal's experience

and they learn about how things are changing.

It connects them with the world around them.

If there are any negatives, what might they be?

I personally don't see one.

As long as we're not frustrating the bear, angering the bear,

-getting its heart rate up, we're fine.

-Yeah.

And of course, we don't ever feed the bears, we don't whistle to them,

we don't bang the side of the machine,

we don't try to draw their attention that way,

we just kind of sit and observe them in their environment.

It's like we're in the cage and we move the cage around.

It is like this weird anti-zoo, it's pretty cool.

GORDON CHUCKLES

Where are you, bear?

There you are.

Something decidedly odd about this. You know, generally...

..my job is a solitary one.

I don't tend to do it with much of a crowd.

Where are you off to, Mr Bear?

Personally, having had the benefit

and luxury of spending time with polar bears in the past,

I like to try and occupy the same little space on the planet

as the animal. Here, I just feel you are separate from its world,

there is a kind of human domain here

and there's a polar bear's domain there.

We're kind of alien visitors, that's how it feels.

'The town of Churchill is remote,

'and it feels isolated from the rest of Canada.

'Eking out an existence here is tough...'

'..and the port, which was a big employer in town,

'recently laid off much of its workforce.'

'So, tourist season is a welcome boost to the local economy.

'Starting in the summer,

'when huge numbers of beluga whales arrive in the mouth of the river.

Mother and calf on the left side coming up!

'In the autumn, the bears and the sightseers arrive in force.'

'But while the tourists enjoy their brief flirtation with danger,

'the locals have to live with the bears week in, week out.'

'Gypsy's diner is a magnet to tourists and locals alike.'

-You must be Fred.

-Yes, I am.

-Gordon.

'The public face of Gypsy's is Fred Da Silva.'

How old were you when you arrived in town?

-20.

-Oh, really?

-20 years old. It was a little bit of a shock.

I wasn't a small-town boy, I was a big-city boy.

-But do you love it here?

-I do now.

It's nice. The people are amazing.

There's a big sense of community.

At night-time, is it wise to kind of walk a few hundred yards

or are you best just to drive?

Best would be to drive.

But in town, we all walk.

You keep your head up at night a little bit more

than you would during the day. You know, don't take back alleys,

try to stay on the main roads,

almost everyone leaves their vehicles unlocked,

their houses unlocked...

We've have had bears break two windows in our restaurant,

-but they've never entered the building.

-Really?

They've got scared with the noise, the window makes when it shatters.

That window up there is a Plexiglas window,

and that window up there is a Plexiglas window as well.

So it's been pretty close.

Do you see them as a problem?

We're the problem. We're the ones that built a town

in their migratory path.

But, I mean, yeah, we had a young girl get attacked.

An older gentleman got attacked, two years ago now, I believe.

So, I mean, yeah, if you asked them, yeah, it's a problem.

'At this time of year, it's easy to be lulled into a false sense

'of security by these beautiful animals.'

'But an adult male can weigh upwards of 500kg,

'and on its hindlegs, can be up to three metres tall.'

'They're fearless hunters, and if a chance

'to eat anything presents itself, they'll take it.'

'The last fatal attack on a human happened

'right on the main street in 1983.'

'Keeping the peace since then is a small team of rangers working for

'Manitoba Conservation, AKA the Polar Bear Cops.'

-Good to meet you.

-You too.

-Thanks for letting me ride along.

'Today, I'm heading out on patrol with Brett Wlock.'

It's been getting busier every week now

and it will be until the end of November.

Is this a hotspot, this area?

Yeah, we get a lot of bear sightings because it's so close to town.

PHONE RINGS

-That's the polar bear line.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-What have we got?

Polar bear alert.

-What have we got?

-False alarm.

-Ah!

-Sorry.

THEY LAUGH

'The polar bear alert phone number is advertised all over town,

'so locals and visitors

'can be Brett's eyes and ears on the ground.'

'Another line of defence are polar bear traps deployed

'around the outskirts of town.'

This trap is baited with seal meat in a bag,

so the bear would be attracted to that.

Yeah, you can smell it.

As soon as that bait is pulled,

the door will drop and the bear'll be caught.

And that little black box there?

That black box is a satellite transmitter that sends us a signal

-as soon as the door drops.

-OK.

So, I can be lying in bed at home or sitting in the office and I'll get

a message on my phone that says trap number eight door has dropped.

'The Polar Bear Alert Program has been running since 1969,

'designed to stop attacks on humans

'and reduce the number of bears being killed.'

'Using tip-offs from the public,

'conservation officers began intercepting bears long before they

'reached the town to prevent dangerous confrontations.'

Were they going back towards the...?

-OVER RADIO:

-'They said it was walking towards the road.

'Today officers use a range of techniques to chase the bears away.'

It could be as easy as driving our truck up to the bear and honking

the horn. I've got different sirens on my...

HE BEEPS HORN

On, you know...

DIFFERENT SIRENS WAIL

Ah! You just made me very jealous. I wish I'd known about that before.

You can try it if you want.

HE TRIES DIFFERENT SIRENS

Oh, yeah. I'm going to have to go all the way through them!

HIGH-PITCHED SIREN WAILS

Ah, that one would do it for me.

That kind of went through me. Oh, or that one.

What's the most effective one?

I like this one.

-I don't know why.

-SIREN BLARES

-It's just the one that I go to.

-I wouldn't be scared of this one.

That sounds a bit comedy, that one.

If I have to get out and follow the bear, I take my shotgun with me.

Some bears will respond to a cracker shell, they'll run away scared,

they'll never come back, some bears won't move, at which point you have

to step up to the rubber slug.

So what it is, is a rubber slug inside,

and this is actually what's inside.

Oh, that is going to... That's going to hurt.

You know, if that doesn't work we have the option of hiring

a helicopter, try to move the bear that way.

Last resort would be a slug to euthanise a bear if we needed to.

That's when human life is in danger, presumably?

Yes, absolutely. Yeah. We don't take that very lightly.

On average, there's 1.5-ish bears euthanised per year.

The bears are a threatened species, we don't want to have to do that.

We have a pretty good record of not euthanising bears.

'It's true that fewer bears are killed than in the old days,

'but one reason for this is that some bears are now locked up.'

'Those that can't be chased away are tranquillised,

'and along with any bears in the traps,

'they're taken to a holding facility on the edge of town...'

'..better known as Polar Bear Jail.'

'Cameras aren't allowed in these days,

'but footage from a few years ago shows the holding cells.'

'Bears are given water but no food,

'as that might encourage them to come back.'

'So these days it's rare to see a bear in town in broad daylight.

'Although at night, it's a different matter.

'There are plenty of dark alleys in this town,

'and bear season coincides with one night of the year

'when everyone wants to be out on the streets.'

KNOCK ON DOOR

Trick or treat?

'Halloween is a big deal in Churchill.'

Happy Halloween.

'So the whole community comes together to make sure

'the town is kept clear of bears.'

'Back in 2013, Halloween itself passed without incident.'

-Oh!

-Whoopee!

SHE LAUGHS

It's hard enough walking,

but being pulled by two strong dogs...

But in the early hours of the following morning,

Erin Greene had a horrifying encounter.

-This is where it happened?

-Yes.

Yeah. I had been at a friend's house with two other people, and it was

approximately five o'clock in the morning.

We'd been outside for two minutes.

And just as we began crossing the street,

that's when my friend Nicky saw the bear kind of just...

-Charging?

-Charging at us, yeah.

And so she said, "Oh, my God, guys, there's a bear."

For one tiny little second,

I did look at the bear and think that it was cute, so there was a...

The first thing was, like, "Oh, wow, it's really cute" and then...

Like, that was like a tiny little smidgen of a second and then

it was, like, horror and terror that just took over.

When I saw the bear running towards us,

I knew right away that it was going to be me because I made contact with

the bear's eyes. Like, I knew he was coming for me.

Really?

Yeah.

When I realised that there was nowhere that I could go and there

was nothing that I could do, I just kind of grounded myself and, erm,

just prepared to fight.

He kind of made a little circle almost to get to the back of my head

and then I tried to punch it and kick it and...

It kind of had its paws on my shoulder, so its jaw was

on my head and then it was using my back and my shoulders kind of as

leverage to tear at my scalp.

I thought that my feet were on the ground the entire time,

but then when I heard other people's versions of the stories,

apparently I was a couple of feet, like, five feet off the ground

and in his mouth.

And from what I've heard, he was kind of hitting me

into that blue house, like he was shaking me like a rag doll.

I could feel that he was ripping my scalp off, I could feel that there

were punctures in my body, but I couldn't feel any pain whatsoever.

And at one point did you just black out?

No, I was conscious during the whole thing, yeah.

I was getting really weak and I knew that I was very injured,

and at that point I thought, "This is how I die, and no-one's coming,

"no-one's coming to help me. I've screamed as loud as I could,

"it's just me and him and this is how I go."

'Thankfully, Erin's screams woke up 69-year-old Bill Ayotte,

'who came outside and confronted the bear.

'Erin was dropped and made her escape,

'but her rescuer wasn't so lucky.'

He ended up grabbing a shovel and just came right at the bear

and smacked it in the eye,

and then that's when the bear started to attack him, and it

became this crazy chaotic scene where people didn't know what to do

because the bear was so close to him that if they shot at the bear

they risked injuring him as well.

People were just throwing anything, shoes, salad bowls,

whatever they could do, they were yelling, screaming.

Another guy put his gun down and charged the bear with his vehicle.

That's what eventually scared the bear up the street.

'Amazingly, both Erin and Bill escaped with their lives

'and made full recoveries,

'but the bear was put down by conservation officers.'

And what's your view of polar bears?

-Has that changed?

-I always loved them and I mean, the fact is that

that's what they do, right?

They're trying to survive as well,

and their life is probably a lot harder than mine is,

and he was just doing what he needed to do to try to survive

and I can't blame an animal for doing that.

As a temporary resident of Churchill,

what one piece of advice you'd give to me, what would it be?

Oh, goodness...

Don't eat too many doughnuts at Gypsy's!

That's, that's advice that I do actually need!

Erm... Don't become a target.

ERIN LAUGHS

No, I would just say, always keep your wits about you and look around

and I wouldn't walk after it gets dark, it's just not worth it.

You can do it, you could do it your whole life and maybe nothing happens

to you, but after knowing what it's like

to experience that, I just don't think it's worth the risk.

'For the locals, Erin's story is a sobering reminder to stay vigilant.

'But in a small town like this,

'that ever-present risk seems to draw the community closer together.'

'One fixture on the social calendar is the Friday night raffle at

'the Royal Canadian Legion,

'where I'm catching up with Dennis for a beer.'

It seems to be that Churchill is about polar bears and community,

that's the two most common words in any conversations.

Sure. I'm sure it's true in any small town,

but here we do have that close contact with the polar bears,

everybody's a bit more protective,

you know, of what they're doing and a bit more worried about

their neighbour and their neighbour's kids and stuff like that.

That seems like a kind of northern thing where you have harsh climate,

you have sort of communities that,

you don't have to like each other, but you have to be prepared

-to help each other.

-Of course you do.

We all have our little squabbles and differences.

If there's a bad bear encounter,

everybody's concerned, because it concerns the whole...

Obviously, it concerns everybody.

There's a great sense of freedom in this town, but that's tempered with

the fact that you have to look over your shoulder all the time.

Is it bringing us down, does it bother us in a negative way?

I don't know, I guess it does sometimes, but for the most part,

we enjoy living with that edginess.

'By the end of October, the bears haven't eaten properly for months.'

'Some resort to chewing seaweed to pass the time.'

'But their keen sense of smell will alert them

'if there's anything more appetising in the area.

'So in Churchill, one of the least glamorous jobs

'is also one of the most important.'

Not trying to steal your job, James. Or am I?

THEY LAUGH

Funny, just walking down the streets, when the garbage is out,

you can smell it, and if I can smell it on a street at 100 yards away,

bears are going to be able to smell it a couple of miles away.

'The man at the wheel today is Dennis Beardy.'

-When was the last time you saw one?

-Yesterday.

-Oh, did you?

-Yeah.

At the complex, they're trying to get into that bin,

you can see the bear paws all over, the prints all over the place.

There's been bears just back here behind Gypsy's the other week.

They come right through town.

Pretty much everybody knows not to leave their garbage out overnight

because a bear will eventually roll around.

You just stay there, James, you take it easy!

So you kind of see people with shotguns and sort of,

people with kind of flare guns. I don't see anything you've got.

I've actually got a flare gun right here.

Do you ever have to use that?

Actually a couple of weeks ago, there was a mother and cubs

hanging around, we had to use it a couple of times to scare them off.

'Until a decade ago,

'household waste ended up at the open pit of the town dump.'

'The sight of desperate polar bears

'rummaging for scraps was depressingly common.'

POLAR BEAR GROWLS

'Numbers painted on their sides identified which bears had already

'had run-ins with the Polar Bear Cops.'

'But with a feast like this on their migration route,

'there were plenty of reoffenders.'

'These days, rubbish is safely stored behind

'the bear-proof gates of an old military hangar.'

'But it still gives off an aroma that sensitive noses

'can pick up for miles around.'

'And on my way out, I walk straight into another close encounter.'

RATTLING

Where are you? Hello, beautiful!

Don't go in there, please, don't go in there.

The polar bear trap has a huge female polar bear

at the back of it trying to get at the seal meat.

The meat is suspended just a foot away at the back of the trap.

I think she maybe knows if she goes into the trap,

she's going to get stuck and she's pushing away at the back.

Freddie, Freddie, can you just maybe back up slowly?

Maybe about 15 metres or so?

ENGINE REVS

OK.

Bit more, Freddie, bit more.

There she is.

OK, steady. Whoa, whoa, whoa.

So we've got mother and cub.

In a situation like this,

I would never ordinarily like to disturb a polar bear,

but on this occasion I really hope that I scare her off,

because what I don't want her to do

is spend the next possibly 30 days in polar bear prison.

And we're not only going to have one bear in polar bear jail,

we're going to have two - baby's going to have to go with her.

The cub's looking a little bit bewildered.

Kind of, it's almost as if it knows its mum's doing something that it

shouldn't be doing. "Come on, Mum.

"Just let's go, I don't want us to get into trouble."

As ever, word has spread fast and a few other cars have turned up

to enjoy the spectacle.

I'm slightly cautious because I don't want her

to get spooked by any other vehicles coming down.

She runs straight towards me, that's not good.

Come on. Just go away. Give up!

OK.

Just get ready.

Maybe start the engine, Freddie.

Don't go in the back.

OK. That's good. Please keep going, keep going.

That's good.

I'm going to keep following her.

CAR ENGINE REVS

Aw, what are you playing at?

GORDON GROANS

Somebody's just started their car and it's spooked her back the way.

I don't know if she can get out that way.

Maybe she can.

Thankfully, this is one mother savvy enough to avoid the trap.

For now, at least.

'Inland from Churchill is one of the biggest

'polar bear denning sites in the world...'

'..Wapusk National Park.'

'Cubs are born in the winter...

'..and emerge from the den in spring.'

'For the next two years, they won't leave their mother's side.'

'In the autumn, when male bears are gathering at the coast,

'mothers with cubs stay away for as long as they can.'

'Male bears can be twice the size of a female, and when hungry,

'they won't think twice about killing a cub.'

'Eventually, the need to feed

'their young will draw all new mothers to the coast.'

'But with the bay still free of ice,

'they need to be wary.'

'Back in town, Brett and his team have been busy,

'and the holding facility is starting to fill up.

'To make room, a bear has been scheduled for release...

'..far away from town.

'This spectacle has become a must-see Churchill event.'

It's pretty surreal. It feels like a kind of a shuttle launch.

This is a young male polar bear.

He's been in this holding area, the polar bear jail,

for eight weeks now.

'Bears are given a sedative before they come out of their cell

'so they can be safely handled and transported to the release site.'

It's not as if he's asleep,

he's just completely immobilised but his eyes are open.

You can see him blink there.

This bear is somewhat of a repeat offender.

He's six years old.

He has been in the clink six times.

Every year of his life, he ends up in the same place,

in the polar bear jail.

'During its eight weeks in the holding facility,

'this bear has lost about a fifth of its body weight.'

'Some believe not feeding the bears in captivity is cruel,

'but the policy is in line

'with studies showing that over the summer,

'bears lose about the same weight in the wild without access to seals.'

Up, up and away.

Now that is something you don't see every day.

It's really nice to get a different view of Churchill.

You realise how small it is.

It's surrounded by this wilderness.

You've got this arboreal forest sort of tundra,

a vast expanse of the Hudson Bay stretching off.

Looking at the town you feel you could just flick it off the map

and it would no longer exist.

'Most of the bears that pass through town are heading north

'where the fresh water coming from the Churchill River

'allows the sea to freeze that bit earlier.'

'A release site has been chosen more than 30 miles north of town

'in the hope that this bear will then continue out

'onto the bay when ice comes.'

If they didn't actually take these bears into custody,

they would literally be roaming the streets of Churchill,

getting themselves into bother, raking through the garbage cans,

possibly posing a threat to people.

So this really is sort of... Like it or loathe it,

this is just a necessary part of actually keeping

the people and the polar bears safe.

Easy does it, easy does it.

Nice and gentle. Great.

And then it's good to go.

We can move forward a little bit now.

'With the drugs still wearing off,

'Brett wants to stick around for a few minutes to check

'that the bear is making good progress.'

You can see that he's got a GPS tag on his right ear.

That's a new initiative we are trying.

We can see where the bear goes after we release it

-and if it is coming back to town.

-OK.

And then will that drop off?

-We'll likely remove it next year when he returns.

-OK.

You can see he's starting to move his head a little bit.

-Yeah.

-In the next 10, 15 minutes, he'll have his head up.

-And how long before he's on his feet?

-Probably an hour.

-OK.

-Yeah.

He's beginning to lift his head.

He lifted it about three inches, so he's coming out of this drug.

We want him to either stay in this area, or head further north.

The one thing we don't want this bear to do is to walk the 60km

back down the coast south towards town, because if he does that,

he's going back to jail.

Yeah. I think if he started to get to his feet,

you'd see how fast I could move.

'With any luck, this bear will have a successful time hunting

'over the winter and survive plenty more years to come.

'But, in the longer term,

'the prospects for this population of bears are uncertain.'

You get a real sense of what the polar bears' natural habitat is

from the air. Trees everywhere, freshwater rivers

and lakes down there.

You've got the ocean here, still not frozen.

Looking out at this type of habitat, I would expect to see grizzly bears,

maybe black bears,

moose, wolves.

The fact there are polar bears living in this type of habitat,

it really does surprise me.

This really is borderline polar bear habitat.

And I don't think you can think about polar bears without thinking

about their future, without thinking about climate change.

Somewhere like this, I can't help but wonder how long will there

be sea ice in this part of Hudson Bay?

The climate is warming.

A lot of what will happen in this area is uncertain.

A lot of what will happen with polar bears is uncertain,

but one thing is for sure.

If the ice does not form in Hudson Bay,

polar bears cannot make a living.

If the sea ice is to disappear, the polar bears will disappear with it.

'The sea ice now tends to form later each autumn and break up earlier

'each spring, leaving the bears

'with less time to hunt through the winter,

'which could already be impacting their numbers.'

'It's now early November and there's still no sign of the ice,

'but winter is clearly on its way.'

'The bears are biding their time.

'Soon enough they'll be out on the ice once again.'

'Before they go, I want to see a little more of them,

'so I'm heading back out on the road with Dennis.'

-Hey, Gordon.

-Taxi for Dennis. How are you?

-Good, man, you?

Yeah, great.

I think just in the time that I've been here,

sort of getting to know the place better and better,

and the more I get to know it, the more I like it.

-Oh, really?

-Yeah, I love it.

I think of this as the kind of place that if I'd washed up here

when I was early 20s...

-You'd be a lifer?

-Probably.

It's like a subtle beauty around here.

It takes a bit of time for it to sink in.

'Dennis has been working with Churchill's bears

'for more than 35 years.

'So after seeing it all first-hand,

'I'm keen to talk to him about how the bears are managed today.'

I know conservation officers don't like the term "polar bear jail".

But that's what it is.

You know, I've never warmed to that as an idea or a concept,

because that's not how a bear wants to spend their 30 days of its year.

Has it ever been suggested that Churchill just has a fence

around it with sort of guards to an entry point at

each end of the town and to guard...

You know, you hit the nail on the head with that one, Gordon.

I mean, that has been bantered around for years.

If you could use fencing, direct them as they flow through town,

then you're doing the right thing. Then you don't have to use force,

you don't have to react with cracker shells

and jail and all the other stuff, you know.

I think there's other ways of dealing with these bears, certainly.

'Longer term, most people here are aware that climate change

'is a serious threat to the bears' future,

'and that prospect has an effect on everything from the attitudes

'of tourists to the economic outlook of the town itself.'

At one time, people would come to Churchill with a big heart

and just enjoyed the fact that they are seeing these beautiful animals.

They're as happy as hell to see a bear

and they're thrilled the whole time they're here.

Now these people, they come to Churchill, you know,

they've got a little lump in their throat.

It affects the locals, as well, because the town of Churchill,

is the polar bear capital of the world,

if you want to invest in a polar bear business,

or if you wanted to build a new hotel, the banks are going to say,

"I don't know if that's a good idea, the bears are going to be gone."

'All across the world, wherever the environment is on the edge,

'the people who depend on that environment are on the edge too.'

You can just go to the right here

and we'll get out and see where these elusive bears are.

-He's over there.

-Over there?

Laying down. It's a well-fed one.

It's a big 'un. Let me grab my camera and we can get a better view.

It's got its head up.

It's curious about something.

-It's weird.

-Something going on.

-It's running now.

-Look, running.

What's going on?

Oh. What's that?

Is it an arctic fox?

I'm sorry. A silver fox. Do you get silver foxes here?

Oh! Yes, of course.

They're pretty rare, silver foxes.

The first time ever seen one of them. It's a beauty.

Wow!

Another bear.

Just stuck his head up for a moment.

-Oh, yeah, there's another one there.

-Yeah.

That's a nice-looking bear.

Spoilt for choice!

-It just shows you...

-You can never be alert enough, right?

-No.

-I'll just have a cautionary look behind me now.

Oh, yeah. Lovely.

There's a majesty to them that is unrivalled.

There's a confidence about them

that you just don't see in any other animal.

Beautiful.

The chap's getting some nice shots, presumably.

It's amazing that people can come from around the world and see

these animals. You've got three cars full of people

that are just, you know,

probably having one of the most memorable moments

of their lives.

But I also think it's nice that,

before too long, these bears can actually

leave this whole circus behind them.

They could spend the whole winter without ever having to

lay their eyes on a single human being.

That must be nice for them.

We always described polar bears as a solitary animal.

Roundabout here, it doesn't really seem that polar bears have kind of

much opportunity to spend time alone.

Oh. What's going on?

Coming straight towards us.

Oh, yes.

In a situation like this, if you have an active bear, of any size,

what distance do you start kind of thinking,

"Well, it's time to get back in the vehicle"?

-40-50 feet.

-Yep.

'If it senses danger, or an opportunity to hunt,

'a polar bear can sprint at over 20mph.

'So, it's best not to try and outrun them.'

I'm just keeping an eye on this bear through my camera.

It skirted round, barely looking at us, but now that we are upwind

of it, it's getting all of our scent blowing straight onto it,

and it's suddenly very much aware that we're here.

And it's gradually getting closer.

-Yeah.

-I think...

-Sorry, guys.

-Yeah.

-Wrap it up and we'll get back in.

That's a dashing distance for a bear like that.

These are bad bears.

These are sub-adults, juvenile delinquents.

Am I going to have to put my window up because of you, bear?

Yeah. If he gets a bit too close, you can just start the engine.

That's definitely a young male.

You beauty, but that's ridiculously close.

Three metres. DENNIS LAUGHS

Who needs one of those big, long lenses

when you can film a polar bear like this?

Get your hand on the key.

Put that window up.

It's slightly misting up in the car,

because we've got a whole crew of people breathing.

He's giving it a good old sniff.

Literally, he's a foot from my face.

This beautiful young male bear.

Oh, gosh, that's just amazing.

Hello. Oh, he's standing up.

OK. Start it up. That's enough.

-Not fooling around.

-OK.

What's dangerous about that is that...that pushing technique,

polar bears are immensely powerful,

and when they get their paws on to something, they can punch

through ice, they can punch through thick snow

and they could punch through the window of a vehicle

very, very easily.

So that's dodgy.

'Encounters like this are a reminder that while viewing wildlife up close

'is a memorable experience,

'our presence will always affect their behaviour.'

'Managing the relationship between humans and bears

'is a huge challenge in Churchill.'

'And the current system

'can sometimes seem a little over the top.'

'The aim is to try and avoid conflict.

'But, for me, I wish there could be a less intrusive approach.'

'As the snow continues to fall,

'the polar bears still wait patiently

'for Hudson Bay to finally freeze over.'

'For me, it's almost time to move on.'

As a place, it is a one-off.

I don't know of... There is nowhere else like it.

The thing I really didn't expect was to come to Churchill and see how

integral polar bears are to so many people's lives here.

But these are undoubtedly tough times for polar bears.

It's tough times for the Arctic.

No-one can say for sure what the future holds.

'Without the sea ice,

'the bears will struggle to maintain a population here.

'If the bears do disappear, it won't be the end for Churchill,

'but the town will lose a fundamental part of its identity.'

As I come to the end of my time here,

you might think that I'd be sad about leaving, but I don't feel sad,

because I know that, very soon after I leave,

every single one of these polar bears will also leave.

They'll leave all of these people behind.

They'll just go back to being the thing that they are -

one of the most incredible hunters that our planet has ever seen.

'After I left, Churchill's polar bears had to wait a little longer.'

'Across the Arctic, this was one of the warmest Novembers on record.'

'But, as December wore on, the ice around Churchill finally froze

'and the bears went on their way.'