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In this New Times investigation, Dougherty examines how a billion dollar oil and gas development by the U.S. and Russian on a the Russian province of Sakhalin threaten to decimate the dwindling population of Western Pacific Gray Whale. The species of whale was thought to be extinct for 30 years until the 1980s when Russian scientists identified a small group of whales who migrated to Sakhalin each summer. But in 1994 a multinational oil agreement was formed between the U.S. and Russia, combining money and resources to tap energy fields in Russia, one such area was a small offshore drilling project in Sakhalin. A small group of scientists, biologists and environmentalist have been lobbying the government to protect the endangered whales, but Dougherty reports that the group's pleas have been largely ignored.