On Thursday, CTV News will share an exclusive look at how Canada is boosting Arctic security aboard the Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker, the Des Groseilliers. ABOVE THE ARCTIC CIRCLE — Even in the Arctic, when the northern lights appear, you drop everything and look up. That’s what happened Tuesday night for our three-person CTV News crew, embedded with the Canadian Coast Guard aboard their icebreaker, the Des Groseilliers. Most of the ship’s crew was asleep while we worked through a late-night edit when CTV News photographer Marley Parker stepped onto the deck for some fresh air. He came back almost immediately. “The northern lights are out.” We rushed into the Arctic night. The wind had eased, the sea was calmer and the sky had cleared. Above us, the aurora borealis seemed to paint a ribbon of green and yellow across the darkness, wrapping the ship in light. Parker set up a time-lapse camera on the bow and left it running for an hour. These are the results. It wasn’t a walrus, a polar bear or an orca sighting. But it may have been the next best thing: a brief September display stretching across the sky above the Northwest Passage.
