On February 4, 2021, as the two-week long scheduled Nunavut Impact Review Board review on the Baffinland expansion was nearing its end, eight hunters from Pond Inlet and Arctic Bay, set up a peaceful blockade at Mary River project's tote road and airstrip. The communities of Pond Inlet and Arctic Bay are nearest the mine site. The local economy is a mixed economy where subsistence hunting compliments wage-earning jobs. The hunters are protesting the expansion and the review process itself, as they feel their wildlife economy is threatened—their communities depend on marine mammals for food. The protesters have formed a line of snowmobiles, their gear-laden wooden sleds, and their tent. The hunters are asking other protestors to not destroy Baffinland's equipment. Dozens of Baffinland's Inuit employees are being paid to stay home to avoid bringing COVID-19 into the small communities. The vast majority of mine workers are non-Inuit who are flown into the work camps.