Even John Oliver placed a bet.
One of the oldest continuously running betting event in the land happens in a state where play is illegal . Here , there are no time slot machines , no horse race , and no cacography - offs . But there ’s one play exception inAlaska , and it revolves around predicting when winter will stop . The event create financing for nonprofit organization , research for climate change , and a hell of a hazard game with big causal agency for festivity .
call in theNenana Ice Classic , each twelvemonth a 26 - foot - marvelous tripod is embedded into the chalk on the Tanana River on the first Saturday in March . Then everyone waits . Usually long into April , sometimes May . And for $ 2.50 a just the ticket , anyone and everyone — occupier of the forty-ninth province or not — can guess when wintertime will last retire its clutches enough for the river to thaw out and the body structure to sink . The guess that amount closest to the official time win ; last yr , the pot was $ 233,591 .
While the game was initially formulated in 1917 as a way for surveyors constructing the Alaska Railroad to slip by the time ( and to keep an eye on river condition — big blocks of methamphetamine could take out bridges ) , it ’s since become so much more .
This is what the last day of winter looks like here.|Flickr/Daisuke Tomiyasu
It ’s also an priceless source of climate change data point for scientist . Basically , the spruce structure is implanted 300 feet from the shoreline and is swipe up to an luxuriant rope - and - pulley system . When the chicken feed breaks apart enough for the tripod to travel 100 foot downriver , it triggers two things : an antique clock in the watchtower stops and a flood siren goes off .
Because there are so few variables ( the tripod is built the same way and put in the same pip every year , and the single - television channel river has never been dammed or otherwise unbalanced ) , it ’s a extremely accurate way to study how clime change has bear on this distant part of Alaska . One subject field , titled " Alaska ’s interchange environment : Documenting Alaska ’s forcible and biological change through observations , " even reference the contest and how it showed that river expose up ( and therefore the beginning of leaping ) is trending in the first place .
If you need to place a wager , you ’ll require to go to one of the 200 or so gas stations , market stores , or bars that are authorize ticket vendor . After you’vepaid for your ticketand fill it out with your contact information and venture , it goes into a large red can . After a duet of months , those bet are brush up - up and sent to Nenana by bush airplane , runway , gondola , and even mush . Once there , a squad of local employees sorts through the stubs ( which often bit in the hundreds of thousands ) entirely by hand .
A very accurate way to study climate change.|Flickr/James Brooks
There ’s a common jape in Alaska that the state is ten years behind the Lower 48 — thelast mates of Blockbustersdidn’t close until 2018 , after all . However , the Ice Classic has n’t really shift since its origin — it certainly has n’t modernized or select vantage of advancing technology .
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Every tag is stop and cross - checked multiple times to control truth . It ’s a unconscious process that ’s so distressingly dumb and dull that by the time it ’s done , not only has the tripod gone under , but wild flower have blossom . And , because there are so many guesses , it ’s often not just one winner , but many . The most people to bet on the right time in one class ? 58 , which was in 1973 . More lately , in 2017 , 42 people guessed right , and each find a check for $ 4584.75 after taxes .
There ’s a probability this year will see even more surmise — it was covered on " Last Week Tonight with John Oliver , " and the innkeeper went so far as to send a staffer dressed as a polar bear to place a single bet for April 26 at 2:17 p.m. give the national care , there ’s a salutary chance the Ice Classic will have been flooded with out - of - state of matter guesswork . Though , just how many more — and the victor of the bunch — won’t be clear for at least a few months .
It’s a beautiful sight to wait for.|Marc Hors Domingo/Moment Open/Getty Images
It’s a humble task, but someone’s gotta do it.|Flickr/J. Stephen Conn
