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Knik Glacier Tours

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Knik Glacier Adventure 4x4 Overland Safari and Jet Boat Adventure

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Knik Glacier Tours - All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go (2024)

Knik Glacier Helicopter Tour

Book This Adventure

Visit the stunning Knik Glacier by helicopter and get you up close and personal with one of Alaska’s most beautiful landscapes.

Not all Alaska helicopter tours come with a glacier landing, but this one does! Experience Knik Glacier like the locals.

Trip Highlights

• Intimate Alaska helicopter glacier tour
• Fly over the majestic mountains of the Chugach Range and land on Knik Glacier.
• View beautiful glacial crevasses, moulins, glacial rivers, and waterfalls.
• Fly down the Great Gorge of the Knik, a National Scenic Landmark.
• Wildlife viewing on this tour, potentially Dall sheep and black bears

What's Included

• Services of a professional Alaska pilot/uide with narration
• 30-minute scenic helicopter flight
• 30-minute glacier landing
• Glacier equipment

Transportation from select locations in Anchorage for $79 per person. For pick up information please click here

Disclaimer:

• Availability will be verified after reservation is received. You will be contacted immediately via email if availability cannot be verified.*
• Other times may be available. Call our office 907-980-8179
• Please Note: No refunds will be provided within 72 hours of tour

This Anchorage helicopter tour departs from a base at Alaska Glacier Lodge and takes you over the Knik River and Glacier, through the Great Gorge towards Whiteout Glacier, Colony Glacier, and the icebergs in Lake George. Land on the Knik Glacier and explore with your pilot/guide. We almost always see moose, mountain goats, bands of Dall sheep, and occasionally bears during the summer months.

Book This Adventure  

#greatlandadventures

• Bev As a solo traveler I usually veer towards group tours and make my decisions based on ratings. Greatland Adventures definitely lived up to their high ratings and awesome reviews. I have booked several tours with them. From the beginning it was a pleasurable experience with Steve and Rochelle who have excellent communication with their clients and ensure you are fully accommodated for your tour. I did the northern lights tour with Mike who is an excellent guide! Very knowledgeable and he captured some excellent photos of me! I completed the glacier tour with Bill who is also very knowledgeable and ensured we had a great experience at the glacier by getting us there before others arrived and allowing us to safe explore all the accessible crevasses. I absolutely recommend this tour company they are amazing!
• Jane I want to sincerely applaud the members of Greatland Adventures! They made me and my friend's trip to Anchorage one of the most amazing experiences ever in our lives... We were all well educated about the lights before we got there and even had a chance to have a pitstop at a gas station to use the toilet and grab a coffee. We even saw the lights that night TWICE! Thank you, Steve! The memories we made will last a lifetime and we are so happy we chose Greatland Adventures. I am telling any and everyone that plans to visit Anchorage to book through them. No question!

Related Trips

Summer Southside Denali Explorer with Glacier Landing

Anchorage Northern Lights Tour

Matanuska Glacier Tour - Winter

Our Most Popular Flight seeing Tour!

Knik glacier explorer.

Join us for this once in a lifetime experience as you fly down the beautiful Knik River Valley and step out of the helicopter onto vast glacial ice.

All Tours Begin in Palmer, Alaska

A beautiful 45 Minute Drive from Anchorage, Alaska Need Transportation from Anchorage? Give us a call & we will book your round trip transportation!

Our Most Popular Glacier Flight seeing Tour!

1 Hour 30 Minutes: 40 Min. Flight + Glacier Landing

1 Hour 30 Minutes 40 Min. Flight + Glacier Landing

Highlights Of The Tour

• Breathtaking Views
• Time on Glacier
• Experience Crystal Clear Blue Pools in the Summer
• In Winter explore frozen icebergs, land next to a giant blue ice wall or a blue ice cave
• Wildlife; be on the lookout for Bear, Moose, Dall sheep and Bald Eagles
• Great for All Ages & Abilities

land on over 300 feet of glacial ice thousands of years old!

Bucketlist experience.

See the Chugach Range from the air as you fly past snow capped mountain peaks and over braided river valleys before landing on over 300 feet of ancient glacial ice! Experience majestic blue pools, swirling moulins, deep crevasses and dramatic ice formations as you step out of your helicopter; onto the icy surface of the Knik Glacier.

The mighty Knik, one of the largest glaciers left in south central Alaska, is twenty-six miles in length and 6 miles across at its toe.

In addition to spotting wildlife from the air, you’ll have an eagle’s eye view of towering waterfalls, glacial iceberg-filled lakes and the untouched wilderness of the Last Frontier!

What To Expect in Summer

As the snow melts and exposes blue glacial ice our expert pilots land your helicopter on the glacier surface where you’ll get to experience brilliant blue melt pools & deep crevasses. In the summer months you can choose to polar plunge into one of these giant pools.

What To Expect in Winter

Experience a winter wonderland of giant frozen icebergs, ice caves and frozen waterfalls. The surface of the glacier may not be safe to land on due to snow depth. Instead landing may be at the terminus of the glacier near an ice wall, on the shoreline of a frozen iceberg filled lake, or in the gorge to explore ice caves.. All offer a chance to experience beautiful blue ice!

The flight adventure of a lifetime

What past customers are saying, “the most amazing, spectacular adventure.”.

“The team at Outbound go out of their way to ensure a fabulous experience and adventure. The glacier was spectacular, an out of the world experience. Almost felt like we were on another planet. Dropping in from a helicopter allowed us to experience the full magnificence and expanse of the Alaskan wilderness. If you are even considering book this – just do it! Life is short and this is an amazing adventure. You deserve this experience.”

– Stephen

“ book it…..now ”.

“From first contact via email to thanking their team and walking out the door, outbound was absolutely amazing! our trip to Knik glacier was a special one for multiple reasons and they exceeded what we had envisioned.

highly recommend outbound heli adventures to anyone planning a trip to one of the most beautiful spots mother nature has created.

book it…..now! ”

– Jared

“one of the best experiences of our lives.”.

“ We did a glacier landing adventure, and unlike some other companies in the area (who we saw land and leave very quickly) we had a good amount of time on the ice where Chris took us on a mini hike to some of the waterfalls and pools on the glacier. It was truly a memorable experience and highly recommend it to everyone. ”

– Michael

Every day is a little different out on the glacier, we want you to be prepared, what to bring on your knik glacier adventure:.

• Small Personal backpack
• Rain Jacket
• Extra Layers
• Hat & Gloves
• Sunglasses (it’s bright on the glacier)
• Extra Camera Batteries
• Empty Memory Cards (You’re going to take a lot of pictures!)
• Water Bottle
• Wear on your feet close toed, sturdy, comfortable shoes.
• An Adventurous Attitude!

Ready to Book with Outbound Heli Adventures?

Important details.

• Shuttle service available from Anchorage to our Departure Location in Palmer, Alaska.
• If our staff cancels due to weather, no charges will apply and you will be refunded or rescheduled.
• All tours require a 2 passenger minimum. Give us a call if you are traveling solo and we will do our best to add you to an existing reservation!
• We provide Crampons/Ice Cleats for safe glacier.
• Dress in layers for Alaska weather and remember to wear closed-toe footwear (no sandals or heels).
• The R44 has a 300lb weight limit per seat & a total combined passenger weight limit of 650lbs. The R66, 4 passenger helicopter has a total combined passenger weight limit of 900lbs. If your party exceeds the total weight limit of the aircraft booked and needs to be flown in multiple helicopters or larger aircraft to accommodate your party, there is an additional fee of $250.

Images From Past Knik Glacier Explorer Adventures

Some of the amazing views you’ll see while flying with us

Looking for A Multiple Landing Flightseeing Tour?

Our chugach explorer is for you, looking for a more adventurous glacier experience, try glacier paddle boarding.

YEAR ROUND KNIK GLACIER LANDING TOUR

Land right on the ice for a guided glacier walk!

See majestic glaciers, wildlife, icebergs, and land right on the ice for a guided glacier walk!

Knik Glacier Landing

Our signature flightseeing and glacier landing tour, available in three different versions. All tours include a glacier landing right in the middle of Knik Glacier, where you can get out of the helicopter and spend about 30 minutes exploring ice thousands of years old with your pilot/guide. See the azure blue melt pools, crevasses, and the bizarre ice formations created by water, wind, and the sun. (summer)

* Tours departing from the Knik River Valley base have transfers available from select Anchorage locations for an additional fee. Transfers are round trip for all summer departure times. The transfers can be booked online when you book your tour. Please refer to our  FAQs page  for detailed pickup information, or contact us for more information.

**YEAR ROUND**

Winter tour landing area will vary due to frozen pools and snow on the glacier

60 Minute Knik Landing Tour

Total Duration

Total Flight

Approx 30 Min

Alaska Glacier Lodge

Glacier Landing

Available *

Total Flight:

Tour Duration:

Not sure where to start?

Talk to one of our experienced alaska travel experts to help book your next heli tour.

(907) 272-7777

(800) 469-0177

Call our local number at (907) 272-7777, or call us toll-free at (800) 469-0177, or you can email us.

Operating Schedule

Our winter office hours are 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM daily. From May 1st through September 15th, we are available from 7:00 AM to 8:00 PM daily. We look forward to speaking with you soon!

29979 E Knik River Rd

Palmer, AK 99645

Tel:  907-272-7777

Email: [email protected]

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Tel. 123-456-7890 Palmer , Alaska

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• April 30, 2018

Special Places – Knik Glacier

Adventures on knik glacier.

Standing barefoot atop ice formed from snow that fell more than 100 years ago, he stripped to board shorts while the guide tied a safety cable across his chest. The cable was a precaution against involuntarily muscle seizure; immobilizing a person to the point they can’t swim – or even get out of the water. Hawaii native and photographer, Stan, was about to take a plunge into a deceptively inviting blue pool of ice melt atop Alaska’s Knik Glacier.

During the peak of the last glacier period (circa 21,500 years ago), Knik Glacier was a river of ice flowing from the north end of the Chugach Mountains toward the basin where the city of Anchorage now sits. Other tributaries joined it along the way: Matanuska, Portage, and many unnamed glaciers to become a massive frozen river more than 20 miles (32 km) across the face, up to 4,000 (1219 m) feet thick, and pushing past the Anchorage bowl into Cook Inlet. Seemingly modest compared to its former self, Knik Glacier has since retreated 50 miles east of Anchorage and now runs 25 (40 km) miles long and 5 miles (8 km) across its face. Despite the shrinkage, it is still one of the largest glaciers in Southcentral Alaska.

Getting to Knik is an adventure in itself. Several modes of transportation are available: all terrain vehicle, jet boat, guided pack rafting, and helicopter. Some adventuresome locals even ride fat tire bikes out there in the spring. Our choice was helicopter with a door-off option. If you don’t mind a bit of wind chill, teary eyes and having your lips blown back to your earlobes – it’s an exhilarating ride and a great way to shoot unobstructed views of the terrain.

The helicopter set down next to a pool of blue water so vibrant it bordered on surreal. Though heli glacier tours are available year-round, it is only from spring to fall that this phenomenon can be seen. Optimal months to photograph glaciers are listed in  Top 30 Alaska Photography Subjects and When to Shoot Them .

The blue was too much for a water bug like Stan to resist. He declared his intention to jump in just as soon as the chopper landed. The rest of the group staged their shots while he was prepped for the jump. Then perched on a platform of ice, Stan crossed himself, sprung, did a heel grab, and splashed down into frigid water. He didn’t stay long…

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ATV & UTV Tours

Knik glacier atv tour.

Our Most Popular Tour

For those adventurous souls that are ready to spend an entire day exploring Alaska’s beauty, our backcountry ATV tour to Knik Glacier  is an unbeatable experience of nature’s wonders. In this full-day tour that takes 6-8 hours, you will see Alaska like you never have before!

• 1 Day (6-8 Hours)
• Availability: March - October
• Skill Level: Beginner
• Driver Min Age: 16+ (With Drivers License)
• Passenger: No Age Restrictions

*ATV drivers are required to have prior experience operating an ATV

**Side by side drivers do NOT need prior experience

The Knik Glacier ATV Tour 1 Day Tour takes you on a ride through a remote, glaciated, backcountry valley. Our expert guides will lead you across beautiful meadows, along streams, and past scenic mountains and waterfalls to the ultimate sight of Alaska’s mighty Knik Glacier. Refuel for the equally stunning trip back with a lunch at this incredible landmark.

After teaching you how to operate the ATV, your guide will lead you on a ride straight into mind-blowing territory! You’ll be taken though all kinds of scenic terrain, including sprawling valleys, fascinating old claim routes for mining, and dense forest, and ultimately seeing one of Alaska’s incredible mountainous glaciers. Don’t forget your camera, as you’re sure to witness wildlife and scenery like you’ve never seen before!

Tour Includes:

• Professional Local Tour Guide
• Orientation and Safety Breifing
• Helmets, Goggles, Dusk Mask, Gloves, Boots and Rain Gear
• Hot Meal (Lunch)
• Orientation

We will provide a safety briefing and orientation to ATV’s. Topics covered will be proper operation of the ATV, general safety information, what to expect while on the tour route, procedures for possible wildlife encounters, and information on proper ATV riding techniques.

Check in Time & Location:

3901 S Lindsey Cir, Palmer, AK 99645

Clients will be met at our Palmer tour office by our guide staff upon arrival. Clients will then be outfitted with a helmets, goggles, dusk mask, gloves, boots and rain gear (if needed). Once clients have signed a standard liability release form, we will begin the safety briefing.

“Everything about the full day tour was top notch from start to finish. Awesome staff, high quality equipment, super exciting trails, amazing scenery. It was an experience I’ll remember for life…10/10 would recommend.”

• Physical Limitations

It is not necessary that clients have previous ATV experience prior to participating in one of our tours. Riding an ATV, as a general rule can be more challenging than driving a car because it requires coordinated physical input such as leaning and moving on the seat to assist the ATV in turning. Drivers need to be prepared to heed the advice of their guide and use their body to be actively involved with the steering and driving of the ATV for proper operation. Please note that the maximum amount of weight an ATV can accommodate is a total of 300 pounds. Also, due to the manufacturers warnings all participants must be at least 16 years old to operate the ATV.

• Reservation Policy

Due to limited capacity, advance reservations are highly recommended. If booking by phone, a credit card is required to confirm and hold your reservation at time of booking. Payment is due upon check-in at our office prior to tour departure and may be handled with cash, check, Visa, M/C American Express or Discover Cards. You have up to 30 days before your tour date to cancel with no penalty to you.

Note: clients are financially responsible for physical damage they may cause to the ATV due to careless, negligent, or accidental operation).

• Transportation

Round trip transportation between Anchorage and our Palmer office is available for an additional $100 per person, (minimum of 2).

Please call our office for pickup times and additional transfer information.

• Driver: $389
• Passenger: $249

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Are ‘Forever Chemicals’ a Forever Problem?

The environmental protection agency says “forever chemicals” must be removed from tap water. but they lurk in much more of what we eat, drink and use..

This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors. Please review the episode audio before quoting from this transcript and email [email protected] with any questions.

From “The New York Times,” I’m Sabrina Tavernise. And this is “The Daily.”

[THEME MUSIC]

This month for the first time, the Environmental Protection Agency began to regulate a class of synthetic chemicals, known as forever chemicals, in America’s drinking water. But the chemicals, which have been linked to liver disease and other serious health problems, are in far more than just our water supply. Today, my colleague Kim Tingley explains.

It’s Wednesday, April 17.

So Kim, any time the EPA announces a regulation, I think we all sort of take notice because implicit in it is this idea that we have been exposed to something — something bad, potentially, lead or asbestos. And recently, the EPA is regulating a type of chemical known as PFAS So for those who don’t know, what are PFAS chemicals

Yeah, so PFAS stands for per and polyfluoroalkyl substances. They’re often called forever chemicals just because they persist so long in the environment and they don’t easily break down. And for that reason, we also use them in a ton of consumer products. They’re in makeup. They’re in carpet. They’re in nonstick cookware. They’re in food packaging, all sorts of things.

Yeah, I feel like I’ve been hearing about these chemicals actually for a very long time. I mean, nonstick pans, Teflon — that’s the thing that’s in my mind when I think PFAS.

Absolutely. Yeah, this class of chemicals has been around for decades. And what’s really important about this is that the EPA has decided, for the first time, to regulate them in drinking water. And that’s a ruling that stands to affect tens of millions of people.

So, help me understand where these things came from and how it’s taken so long to get to the point where we’re actually regulating them.

So, they really actually came about a long time ago. In 1938, DuPont, the people who eventually got us to Teflon, they were actually looking for a more stable kind of refrigerant. And they came upon this kind of chemical, PFAS. The thing that all PFAS chemicals have is a really strong bond between carbon atoms and fluorine atoms. This particular pairing is super strong and super durable.

They have water repellent properties. They’re stain resistant. They’re grease resistant. And they found a lot of uses for them initially in World War II. They were using them as part of their uranium enrichment process to do all these kinds of things. And then —

Well, good thing it’s Teflon.

In the 1950s is when they really started to come out as commercial products.

Even burned food won’t stick to Teflon. So it’s always easy to clean.

So, DuPont started using it in Teflon pans.

Cookware never needs scouring if it has DuPont Teflon.

And then another company, 3M also started using a kind of PFAS —

Scotchgard fabric protector. It keeps ordinary spills from becoming extraordinary stains.

— in one of their big products, Scotchgard. So you probably remember spraying that on your shoes if you want to make your shoes waterproof.

Use Scotchgard fabric protector and let your cup runneth over.

Right — miracle product, Scotchgard, Teflon. But of course, we’re talking about these chemicals because they’ve been found to pose health threats. When does that risk start to surface?

Yeah, so it’s pretty early on that DuPont and 3M start finding effects in animals in studies that they’re running in house.

Around the mid ‘60s, they start seeing that PFAS has an effect on rats. It’s increasing the liver and kidney weights of the rats. And so that seems problematic. And they keep running tests over the next decade and a half. And they try different things with different animals.

In one study, they gave monkeys really, really high levels of PFAS. And those monkeys died. And so they have a pretty strong sense that these chemicals could be dangerous. And then in 1979, they start to see that the workers that are in the plants manufacturing, working with these chemicals, that they’re starting to have higher rates of abnormal liver function. And in a Teflon plant, they had some pregnant workers that were working with these chemicals. And one of those workers in 1981 gave birth to a child who had some pretty severe birth defects.

And then by the mid 1980s, DuPont figures out that it’s not just their workers who are being exposed to these chemicals, but communities that are living in areas surrounding their Teflon plant, particularly the one in Parkersburg, West Virginia, that those communities have PFAS in their tap water.

Wow, so based on its own studies, DuPont knows its chemicals are making animals sick. They seem to be making workers sick. And now they found out that the chemicals have made their way into the water supply. What do they do with that information?

As far as we know, they didn’t do much. They certainly didn’t tell the residents of Parkersburg who were drinking that water that there was anything that they needed to be worried about.

How is that possible? I mean, setting aside the fact that DuPont is the one actually studying the health effects of its own chemicals, presumably to make sure they’re safe, we’ve seen these big, regulating agencies like the EPA and the FDA that exist in order to watch out for something exactly like this, a company that is producing something that may be harming Americans. Why weren’t they keeping a closer watch?

Yeah, so it goes kind of back to the way that we regulate chemicals in the US. It goes through an act called the Toxic Substances Control Act that’s administered by the EPA. And basically, it gives companies a lot of room to regulate themselves, in a sense. Under this act they have a responsibility to report to the EPA if they find these kinds of potential issues with a chemical. They have a responsibility to do their due diligence when they’re putting a chemical out into the environment.

But there’s really not a ton of oversight. The enforcement mechanism is that the EPA can find them. But this kind of thing can happen pretty easily where DuPont keeps going with something that they think might really be a problem and then the fine, by the time it plays out, is just a tiny fraction of what DuPont has earned from producing these chemicals. And so really, the incentive is for them to take the punishment at the end, rather than pull it out early.

So it seems like it’s just self-reporting, which is basically self-regulation in a way.

Yeah, I think that is the way a lot of advocacy groups and experts have characterized it to me, is that chemical companies are essentially regulating themselves.

So how did this danger eventually come to light? I mean, if this is in some kind of DuPont vault, what happened?

Well, there’s a couple different things that started to happen in the late ‘90s.

The community around Parkersburg, West Virginia, people had reported seeing really strange symptoms in their animals. Cows were losing their hair. They had lesions. They were behaving strangely. Some of their calves were dying. And a lot of people in the community felt like they were having health problems that just didn’t really have a good answer, mysterious sicknesses, and some cases of cancers.

And so they initiate a class action lawsuit against DuPont. As part of that class action lawsuit, DuPont, at a certain point, is forced to turn over all of their internal documentation. And so what was in the files was all of that research that we mentioned all of the studies about — animals, and workers, the birth defects. It was really the first time that the public saw what DuPont and 3M had already seen, which is the potential health harms of these chemicals.

So that seems pretty damning. I mean, what happened to the company?

So, DuPont and 3M are still able to say these were just a few workers. And they were working with high levels of the chemicals, more than a person would get drinking it in the water. And so there’s still an opportunity for this to be kind of correlation, but not causation. There’s not really a way to use that data to prove for sure that it was PFAS that caused these health problems.

In other words, the company is arguing, look, yes, these two things exist at the same time. But it doesn’t mean that one caused the other.

Exactly. And so one of the things that this class action lawsuit demands in the settlement that they eventually reach with DuPont is they want DuPont to fund a formal independent health study of the communities that are affected by this PFAS in their drinking water. And so they want DuPont to pay to figure out for sure, using the best available science, how many of these health problems are potentially related to their chemicals.

And so they ask them to pay for it. And they get together an independent group of researchers to undertake this study. And it ends up being the first — and it still might be the biggest — epidemiological study of PFAS in a community. They’ve got about 69,000 participants in this study.

Wow, that’s big.

It’s big, yeah. And what they ended up deciding was that they could confidently say that there was what they ended up calling a probable link. And so they were really confident that the chemical exposure that the study participants had experienced was linked to high cholesterol, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, testicular cancer, kidney cancer, and pregnancy induced hypertension.

And so those were the conditions that they were able to say, with a good degree of certainty, were related to their chemical exposure. There were others that they just didn’t have the evidence to reach a strong conclusion.

So overall, pretty substantial health effects, and kind of vindicates the communities in West Virginia that were claiming that these chemicals were really affecting their health.

Absolutely. And as the years have gone on, that was sort of just the beginning of researchers starting to understand all the different kinds of health problems that these chemicals could potentially be causing. And so since the big DuPont class action study, there’s really just been like this building and building and building of different researchers coming out with these different pieces of evidence that have accumulated to a pretty alarming picture of what some of the potential health outcomes could be.

OK, so that really kind of brings us to the present moment, when, at last, it seems the EPA is saying enough is enough. We need to regulate these things.

Yeah, it seems like the EPA has been watching this preponderance of evidence accumulate. And they’re sort of deciding that it’s a real health problem, potentially, that they need to regulate.

So the EPA has identified six of these PFAS chemicals that it’s going to regulate. But the concern that I think a lot of experts have is that this particular regulation is not going to keep PFAS out of our bodies.

We’ll be right back.

So, Kim, you just said that these regulations probably won’t keep PFAS chemicals out of our bodies. What did you mean?

Well, the EPA is talking about regulating these six kinds of PFAS. But there are actually more than 10,000 different kinds of PFAS that are already being produced and out there in the environment.

And why those six, exactly? I mean, is it because those are the ones responsible for most of the harm?

Those are the ones that the EPA has seen enough evidence about that they are confident that they are probably causing harm. But it doesn’t mean that the other ones are not also doing something similar. It’s just sort of impossible for researchers to be able to test each individual chemical compound and try to link it to a health outcome.

I talked to a lot of researchers who were involved in this area and they said that they haven’t really seen a PFAS that doesn’t have a harm, but they just don’t have information on the vast majority of these compounds.

So in other words, we just haven’t studied the rest of them enough yet to even know how harmful they actually are, which is kind of alarming.

Yeah, that’s right. And there’s just new ones coming out all the time.

Right. OK, so of the six that the EPA is actually intending to regulate, though, are those new regulations strict enough to keep these chemicals out of our bodies?

So the regulations for those six chemicals really only cover getting them out of the drinking water. And drinking water only really accounts for about 20 percent of a person’s overall PFAS exposure.

So only a fifth of the total exposure.

Yeah. There are lots of other ways that you can come into contact with PFAS. We eat PFAS, we inhale PFAS. We rub it on our skin. It’s in so many different products. And sometimes those products are not ones that you would necessarily think of. They’re in carpets. They’re in furniture. They’re in dental floss, raincoats, vinyl flooring, artificial turf. All kinds of products that you want to be either waterproof or stain resistant or both have these chemicals in them.

So, the cities and towns are going to have to figure out how to test for and monitor for these six kinds of PFAS. And then they’re also going to have to figure out how to filter them out of the water supply. I think a lot of people are concerned that this is going to be just a really expensive endeavor, and it’s also not really going to take care of the entire problem.

Right. And if you step back and really look at the bigger problem, the companies are still making these things, right? I mean, we’re running around trying to regulate this stuff at the end stage. But these things are still being dumped into the environment.

Yeah. I think it’s a huge criticism of our regulatory policy. There’s a lot of onus put on the EPA to prove that a harm has happened once the chemicals are already out there and then to regulate the chemicals. And I think that there’s a criticism that we should do things the other way around, so tougher regulations on the front end before it goes out into the environment.

And that’s what the European Union has been doing. The European Chemicals Agency puts more of the burden on companies to prove that their products and their chemicals are safe. And the European Chemicals Agency is also, right now, considering just a ban on all PFAS products.

So is that a kind of model, perhaps, of what a tough regulation could look like in the US?

There’s two sides to that question. And the first side is that a lot of people feel like it would be better if these chemical companies had to meet a higher standard of proof in terms of demonstrating that their products or their chemicals are going to be safe once they’ve been put out in the environment.

The other side is that doing that kind of upfront research can be really expensive and could potentially limit companies who are trying to innovate in that space. In terms of PFAS, specifically, this is a really important chemical for us. And a lot of the things that we use it in, there’s not necessarily a great placement at the ready that we can just swap in. And so it’s used in all sorts of really important medical devices or renewable energy industries or firefighting foam.

And in some cases, there are alternatives that might be safer that companies can use. But in other cases, they just don’t have that yet. And so PFAS is still really important to our daily lives.

Right. And that kind of leaves us in a pickle because we know these things might be harming us. Yet, we’re kind of stuck with them, at least for now. So, let me just ask you this question, Kim, which I’ve been wanting to ask you since the beginning of this episode, which is, if you’re a person who is concerned about your exposure to PFAS, what do you do?

Yeah. So this is really tricky and I asked everybody this question who I talked to. And everybody has a little bit of a different answer based on their circumstance. For me what I ended up doing was getting rid of the things that I could sort of spot and get rid of. And so I got rid of some carpeting and I checked, when I was buying my son a raincoat, that it was made by a company that didn’t use PFAS.

It’s also expensive. And so if you can afford to get a raincoat from a place that doesn’t manufacture PFAS, it’s going to cost more than if you buy the budget raincoat. And so it’s kind of unfair to put the onus on consumers in that way. And it’s also just not necessarily clear where exactly your exposure is coming from.

So I talk to people who said, well, it’s in dust, so I vacuum a lot. Or it’s in my cleaning products, so I use natural cleaning products. And so I think it’s really sort of a scattershot approach that consumers can take. But I don’t think that there is a magic approach that gets you a PFAS-free life.

So Kim, this is pretty dark, I have to say. And I think what’s frustrating is that it feels like we have these government agencies that are supposed to be protecting our health. But when you drill down here, the guidance is really more like you’re on your own. I mean, it’s hard not to just throw up your hands and say, I give up.

Yeah. I think it’s really tricky to try to know what you do with all of this information as an individual. As much as you can, you can try to limit your individual exposure. But it seems to me as though it’s at a regulatory level that meaningful change would happen, and not so much throwing out your pots and pans and getting new ones.

One thing about PFAS is just that we’re in this stage still of trying to understand exactly what it’s doing inside of us. And so there’s a certain amount of research that has to happen in order to both convince people that there’s a real problem that needs to be solved, and clean up what we’ve put out there. And so I think that we’re sort of in the middle of that arc. And I think that that’s the point at which people start looking for solutions.

Kim, thank you.

Here’s what else you should know today. On Tuesday, in day two of jury selection for the historic hush money case against Donald Trump, lawyers succeeded in selecting 7 jurors out of the 12 that are required for the criminal trial after failing to pick a single juror on Monday.

Lawyers for Trump repeatedly sought to remove potential jurors whom they argued were biased against the president. Among the reasons they cited were social media posts expressing negative views of the former President and, in one case, a video posted by a potential juror of New Yorkers celebrating Trump’s loss in the 2020 election. Once a full jury is seated, which could come as early as Friday, the criminal trial is expected to last about six weeks.

Today’s episode was produced by Clare Toeniskoetter, Shannon Lin, Summer Thomad, Stella Tan, and Jessica Cheung, with help from Sydney Harper. It was edited by Devon Taylor, fact checked by Susan Lee, contains original music by Dan Powell, Elisheba Ittoop, and Marion Lozano, and was engineered by Chris Wood.

Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly.

That’s it for The Daily. I’m Sabrina Tavernise. See you tomorrow.

• April 18, 2024   •   30:07 The Opening Days of Trump’s First Criminal Trial
• April 17, 2024   •   24:52 Are ‘Forever Chemicals’ a Forever Problem?
• April 16, 2024   •   29:29 A.I.’s Original Sin
• April 15, 2024   •   24:07 Iran’s Unprecedented Attack on Israel
• April 14, 2024   •   46:17 The Sunday Read: ‘What I Saw Working at The National Enquirer During Donald Trump’s Rise’
• April 12, 2024   •   34:23 How One Family Lost $900,000 in a Timeshare Scam
• April 11, 2024   •   28:39 The Staggering Success of Trump’s Trial Delay Tactics
• April 10, 2024   •   22:49 Trump’s Abortion Dilemma
• April 9, 2024   •   30:48 How Tesla Planted the Seeds for Its Own Potential Downfall
• April 8, 2024   •   30:28 The Eclipse Chaser
• April 7, 2024 The Sunday Read: ‘What Deathbed Visions Teach Us About Living’
• April 5, 2024   •   29:11 An Engineering Experiment to Cool the Earth

Hosted by Sabrina Tavernise

Featuring Kim Tingley

Produced by Clare Toeniskoetter ,  Shannon M. Lin ,  Summer Thomad ,  Stella Tan and Jessica Cheung

With Sydney Harper

Edited by Devon Taylor

Original music by Dan Powell ,  Elisheba Ittoop and Marion Lozano

Engineered by Chris Wood

Listen and follow The Daily Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music

The Environmental Protection Agency has begun for the first time to regulate a class of synthetic chemicals known as “forever chemicals” in America’s drinking water.

Kim Tingley, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, explains how these chemicals, which have been linked to liver disease and other serious health problems, came to be in the water supply — and in many more places.

On today’s episode

Kim Tingley , a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine.

Background reading

“Forever chemicals” are everywhere. What are they doing to us?

The E.P.A. issued its rule about “forever chemicals” last week.

There are a lot of ways to listen to The Daily. Here’s how.

We aim to make transcripts available the next workday after an episode’s publication. You can find them at the top of the page.

Fact-checking by Susan Lee .

The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsky, John Ketchum, Nina Feldman, Will Reid, Carlos Prieto, Ben Calhoun, Susan Lee, Lexie Diao, Mary Wilson, Alex Stern, Dan Farrell, Sophia Lanman, Shannon Lin, Diane Wong, Devon Taylor, Alyssa Moxley, Summer Thomad, Olivia Natt, Daniel Ramirez and Brendan Klinkenberg.

Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Paula Szuchman, Lisa Tobin, Larissa Anderson, Julia Simon, Sofia Milan, Mahima Chablani, Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Jeffrey Miranda, Renan Borelli, Maddy Masiello, Isabella Anderson and Nina Lassam.

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