11 minute read
Gone Global
GLOBAL gone
Marine scientists. Wave whisperers. Wildlife photogs. Concrete craftsmen. Meet four Outer Banks experts who share their knowledge with the world at-large — using skills they practice right here at home.
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Every Olympian knows one thing: when it’s your turn to shine, you better not choke. (Just ask Simone Biles.) Same goes for the folks behind the scenes, from the painter who stripes the swimming pool to the broadcast crew streaming the award ceremonies. And yet, not one of them understands the need to perform like Kill Devil Hills’ own Kurt Korte did in Tokyo this past summer. Because nobody’s ever felt that type of pressure before. “This was surfing’s Olympic debut,” says Korte, who served as the International Olympic Committee’s official Surf Forecaster. “So there was a bit of a learning curve. Because most sports, they know when they’ll run down to the second. With surfing, the ocean tells us when to run — the surf tells us when to run. Then that becomes, ‘Kurt, you tell us when the surf will be good, so we know when to run.’ [Laughs] So, yeah, that’s a little bit stressful. Because I f—kin’ hate it when I screw up a forecast.” Add a series of lead-up interviews with national outlets like NPR and the Associated Press — not to mention a New York Times profile titled “The Wave Whisperer” — and you could forgive the lifelong meteorologist for suffering his own case of “the Twisties.” But while it may have been Korte’s first Olympics — it’s hardly his first time on the world stage. As the Director of Atlantic forecasting for Surfline.com — the digital Duke Kahanamoku of wave prediction — the 16year vet’s helped predict the International Surfing Association’s World Surfing Games and been onsite for World Surf League Championship Tour events in Portugal and Tahiti. But it wasn’t his role calling conditions for the sport’s top athletes that sent Korte to Japan’s Tsurigasaki Surfing Beach this July; it was his experience telling workaday waveriders when to call in sick — from Maine to the Caribbean, Brazil to Morocco — particularly the diehards who surf right here. “In anticipation of the Olympics, both the ISA and WSL asked us to do multiple studies on Japan,” Korte explains. “And we realized the wave climate at Tsurigasaki is really similar to the Outer Banks. The way the coastline faces, the predominant winds, there’s a warm water current that’s right off the coast — just like the Gulf Stream. It made sense for the onsite forecaster to have experience with those conditions, so the ISA asked me to go over and do it.” In fact, he had to go over and do it twice. Turns out, for every Olympic category, they actually run a mock event to work out the kinks. So, in 2019, Korte visited the contest site, where they tested a full range of scenarios‚ including the prospect of squeezing two days together in case the waves gave out. Lucky thing, because that’s exactly the call Kurt had to make when they ran heats for real this past July. “We were scheduled to run over four days,” he explains. “Days two and three looked to be pretty solid because of a tropical system, but it looked like the swell might drop off significantly. So that was the toughest forecast call: do we push through and run the last day in challenging, overhead chunky surf? Or stay on schedule and run the risk of it being much smaller?” Kurt knew what he wanted as a surfer and a spectator: overhead and thrilling always beats chest high and predictable. But the Olympics isn’t just a battle between certain athletes — it’s part of a televised, international event. “Each day, we had a series of meetings with all the various other stakeholders — the IOC, ISA, Tokyo 2020, Olympic Broadcast Services. My opinion was strongest about the surf, but there were others who were focused on broadcasting and other logistics. I didn’t strut in and say, ‘Hey, we’re running tomorrow’ and walk out.” [Laughs] In the end, Kurt’s call persevered. And when July 27 finished, not only did it produce the competition’s best day of action, they crowned the sport’s first-ever Olympic champions. As the cameras captured Brazil’s Italo Ferreira and Hawaii’s Carissa Moore biting their historic Gold medals, the work crews were already packing up scaffolding. But for Kurt, the contest wasn’t quite over. “There was always a slight chance the next day was gonna be eight-foot and kegging,” he says. “So when I woke up the next
morning and looked out my window, I was like, ‘Oh, God, thank you.’ It was only chest high — and clean — but kind of closed out. Actually, it looked a lot like home.” So what’d he do? He paddled out — of course. Caught a few familiar waves and basked in some well-earned, once-in-alifetime emotions. “World tour events are cool, but they run those things every year,” he says. “Leaving Japan, I think everyone had a real feeling of being part of something special. Because it was the first Olympic surfing event ever.”JAPANHow KDH’s Kurt Korte delivered a Gold-medal forecast for surfing’s Olympics debut. “When I woke up the next morning and looked out my window, I was like, ‘Oh, God, thank you.’” But it sure won’t be the last. Come 2024, the planet’s best waveriders will head to Tahiti — home of the world famous Teahupo’o. After that, it’s Los Angeles and Australia — two surfing meccas in their own right. Does that mean Kurt needs to order some new Team USA sport coats? “We already did the study for Paris 2024,” he says. “Needless to say, Tahiti performed a little better than France. But it’s not like I’m the Olympic forecaster now. We have plenty of talent who could end up onsite, so I’ll worry about all that in 2023.” Until then he’ll continue to track the oceans for the next swell event — be it a major competition, a major storm, or just the average, everyday conditions that keep most surfers wet. So, which ones does he worry about most? “I’d rather score a good day here, because I get to paddle out,” he laughs. “That’s maybe a more tangible reward than helping somebody get waves in the Canary Islands. But, in the end, I really just want to be right. Nobody wants me to be right more than me.” — Stu Nahan
FOCUS pure
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Buckler enjoys a rare moment in front of the lens. Iceland, 2021. Photo: Daniel Bergmann
Mark Buckler loves shooting the natural world — then sharing the knowledge.
At age 14, Mark Buckler already knew he wanted to travel the world taking photos. Several decades and detours later, the self-taught professional lensman is right where he dreamed: circling the globe with cameras in hand and sharing that joy with burgeoning shooters. So far in 2021, the Southern Shores resident has led workshops in Alaska, South Africa, Iceland, Hawaii, Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and Florida. And yet, some of his favorite images and memories happen right here.
“For the photography that I like to do, which is wildlife, landscape and nature photography, I think the Outer Banks is as good a location as there is in North America,” Buckler says. “We may not have the majestic beauty of the American Southwest, but there’s a great deal of what you might call subtle beauty, because of our wildlife and natural landscapes.”
Buckler’s enthusiasm for photography started with a freshman year wildlife biology class at his high school in Hyannis, on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. His teacher, Pete Auger, was working on his doctorate and employed innovate methods, including professional level wildlife field research and using photography for data collection. Buckler got hooked on both. His parents got him a 35mm camera for his birthday, and in-between school and sports, he pursued the hobby, often developing his own photos in the school dark room.
After graduating, Buckler studied wildlife biology at the University of Vermont, where he also played baseball. He knew he wanted to do something with photography for a career —but at first, the universe had different plans. Professional scouts had taken notice of Buckler, and to his great surprise, two days after he graduated college, the Oakland A’s called. So, professional second baseman it was.
But, after two years, Buckler was done with pro ball. He went back to his roots on Cape Cod, where he was strong-armed by his former teacher into substitute teaching. That led to coaching baseball and teaching kids wildlife biology at his old school — right alongside his mentor. He liked it so much, he stayed for 14 years, until one day he had to try something new. He took a job at a school in Raleigh, but after a year, he realized he needed more than a change of scenery.
“It was time to do something else,” he says. “I knew that if there was some way I could do photography for a living, I wanted to do that.”
Having visited the Outer Banks to shoot photos, Buckler recognized that, if he could get here, he’d be one step closer to becoming a full-time lensman. In 2005, he applied to be the program director for Corolla’s brand-new Outer Banks Center for Wildlife Education.
Almost immediately, things started to click. He started by adding nature photography tours and workshops to the center’s programming. Then, in 2006, he won a North American Nature Photographer’s Association contest with a photo of two black-bellied plovers fighting.
“That was very helpful for me,” Buckler says. “I was new in the area and all of a sudden people in the photography community in the mid-Atlantic and South knew my name.”
After four years with the Wildlife Center, he became director of Pine Island Audubon Sanctuary — another great place for shooting critters. (Figuratively speaking.) He also started leading photography tours on the side. In 2012, he was ready to jump in and do full-time what he loved most. In fact, Buckler wanted to go worldwide right out of the gate, but his wife, Kara Lashley, reeled him in.
“I was very fortunate that my wife has a keen business sense,” he says. “She said, ‘You need to step back and become an Outer Banks photo guide first.’ And she was absolutely right.” (In May and June, he hosted Outer Banks workshops for 57 straight days.) Buckler says most residents don’t realize what a treasure this place is for wildlife photography — 99 percent of his clients are from outside of eastern North Carolina — but then, much of the world isn’t aware, either.
“The Outer Banks is really an unknown, amazing photo location,” he says. “We have the highest concentration of black bears in the world. The most significant area for wintering ducks, geese and swans. We have 11 wildlife refuges nearby where you can see world-class wildlife events every day. Not to mention horses on the beach.”
After a few solid years, Buckler was ready to branch out again. He started offering trips to places he knew well: the Georgia and Florida coasts, Pacific Northwest, the Southwest, Hawaii, and more. Then he added Alaska, his favorite destination, where he and his clients photograph grizzly bears chasing salmon. In 2019, he forged into Iceland. This year, he explored South Africa. In 2022, he’s leading his first trip to Svalbard, Norway, above the Arctic Circle, to photograph polar bears.
But Buckler is more than a photography teacher. He’s a location scout, travel agent, marketing professional, entertainer — and, sometimes, amateur psychologist.
“Leading trips is intense,” he says. “I need to manage personalities, get people where they’re supposed to be, teach and make sure everyone has a good time. I’m constantly on from the time I get up to the time I go to bed. The only downtime is a bathroom break.”
He spends six months a year, maybe more, on the road, with small, intimate groups of four-to-six people or giving presentations at camera clubs and wildlife festivals. And while no dream job is perfect — “it’s hard being away from home and family” — Buckler has no complaints.
“I really like taking people to places and sharing knowledge of photography, wildlife, the location, and the natural systems that are there,” he says. “I’ve always loved learning, so teaching people continues that for me. At the same time, I get to help people improve their photography, and that’s rewarding.”
