The world was still living under the shadow of the Cold War, so when the news broke that a Soviet nuclear satellite had come crashing down in the Northwest Territories, all eyes turned northward.

"It created quite a stir," says Yellowknife resident Les Robertson, who was a teacher at William McDonald school at the time. "I don't remember any specifics but there was always the fear of any contamination and stuff like that."

When Cosmos 954 -- a radar reconnaissance satellite -- crashed, it scattered some 124,000 square kilometres of the Northern landscape with debris; all the way from near Great Slave Lake's East Arm to Baker Lake. Approximately 100 pounds of radioactive material was on board.

An army of military personal, scientists, nuclear inspectors and Southern media quickly followed, searching for any remnants that didn't burn upon re-entry into the atmosphere. A carnival-like atmosphere soon blossomed in both Yellowknife and Hay River as the human deluge grew and grew.

"It was kind of strange because people were walking around downtown (Hay River) normally and all these Armed Forces people in suits were walking around with geiger counters," recalls George Low, a fisheries management biologist with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

Seen any three-eyed fish?

While no one was injured in the crash, there was lots of concern over possible radioactive contamination. Only about one per cent of the satellite was ever recovered.

Low was part of a DFO team that spent the spring of 1978 collecting fish on Great Slave Lake to compare with later samples once the ice melted and the potentially radioactive debris began to sink into the water.

Twenty-five years later, the fish seem to be doing fine.

"The only weird thing that happened, the very next fall we had an exceptional run of dog (chum) salmon," says Low. "Of course, right away people thought they were lake trout that were showing the effects of the satellite."

Although very little of the satellite was ever recovered, a significant portion was found by a group of canoeists overwintering near Warden's Grove inside the Thelon Wildlife Sanctuary.

Chris Norment, now a university professor living in Brockport, N.Y., was one of the six canoeists who -- after spending eight months travelling the North in relative seclusion -- all of a sudden found themselves in the middle of a media frenzy. Norment was a 26-year-old adventurer at the time. They knew the search was on through their daily communications with Atmospheric Environment Service in Yellowknife, but when two of the expedition members -- John Mordhurst and Michael Mobley -- returned to camp a few days after the crash with tales of something strange imbedded in the ice, they still couldn't believe it was the satellite.

"So we call it into Yellowknife and there's this long silence there, and they're thinking, 'These guys have got to be pulling our legs,' " says Norment.

"Then the next communication comes back about an hour later. It says: 'Don't touch this thing.' "

The next morning a Canadian Forces Twin Otter arrived with personnel garbed in radiation suits. Mobley and Mordhurst were whisked away to Edmonton to be tested for radiation exposure, while the remaining four went to Yellowknife to meet the media.

Out of the bush, into the bath

"So we go from a very quiet, simple existence to all of a sudden we're in Yellowknife being fed pizza and getting back rubs from the nurses," Norment laughs.

The media excitement didn't last long. After lounging and growing bored at the Explorer Hotel for two weeks, they were allowed to return to their camp only to find their previous solitude had been usurped by a full-scale military command post erected nearby.

"They brought in two-and-a-half ton mess trucks, they had showers in there, and movie facilities," Norment recalls. "It was not what we wanted."

Eventually, Operation Morning Light -- as it was called -- was scaled back and the canoeists were allowed to continue their journey to Baker Lake in peace once summer began to arrive.

Stovepipe satellite

The various -- mostly tiny -- pieces of satellite recovered wound up in the hands of the Canadian government after the Soviets reneged on most of the clean-up costs.

In 1982, however, several portions, include a two-foot long badly warped and melted tube structure, were given to the Northern Heritage Centre. It remains uncertain whether it was part of the Thelon find.

Curator Joanne Bird refers to the bigger piece as the "stovepipe". She says she forgot all about the 25th anniversary date of the crash, but will bring it out for display if people start showing interest.

"It's in our store room," says Bird. "It doesn't really fit into the gallery storyline at the moment."