Marcellus Shale Earth First! Aerial Blockade Celebrates 2 Weeks

DONATE TO THIS CAMPAIGN NOW! KEEP HELLBENDER & THEIR CREW SUPPLIED!

To get directly involved, reach a spokesperson for comment, or donate supplies (tarps, blankets, bulk foods, hand warmers, ropes, harnesses, carabiners, winter boots/clothing, etc.) please contact MarcellusEarthFirst@Riseup.net

Just south of the “New York” and “Pennsylvania” border a battle is raging to defend the Loyalsock state forest in what isknown as Sullivan County, PA, about a half hour north of what is known as the city of Williamsport which lies at the southernmost part of traditional Haudenosaunee Confederacy territory. The high elevation wetlands, and mature forest ecosystems of Loyalsock are home to rare and threatened species such as the Timber Rattlesnake, Northern Water Shrew, Wild Sasparilla, and carnivorous Pitcher Plants. 114,494 acres of this lush forest sit atop the Marcellus Shale, an underground formation that spans from West Virginia to as far north as Ithaca, NY. Houston based corporation Anadarko Petroleum Corporation (APC) has been craving to penetrate this shale formation. APC has proposed developing 26 fracking well-padsalong with multiple pipelines, access roads, and other supporting infrastructure which are poised to devastate the lively streams that sustain all animal and plant life in the Loyalsock. In nearby, Sproul State Forest, Anadarko has spilled over 12,000 gallons of carcinogenic drilling mud. Andarko was also a key investor in British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig that exploded in 2010 killing 11 workers and releasing 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico forever altering the ecosystem. APC was ordered to pay $272 million towards cleaning up the Gulf. Anadarko refused.

People united under the banner of, Marcellus Shale Earth First! (MSEF!), whose tagline is, “No Drilling! No Compromise!”, have sworn to defend the Loyalsock forest from Anadarko’s ecocidal ways.  On September 13th, two weeks ago today, the first aerial blockade was erected at the site of a proposed well pad. Should Anadarko continue with their plans, activists say there could be many more blockades in this forest. High in the canopy of the forest  sits a brave tree sitter on a platform who chooses to identify themselves as Hellbender, the name of the giant salamander of the North East who makes it’s home in the Loyalsock forest. 

Sabotaging the Badger Cull

By Josh Loeb and Maya Oppenheim / Hackney Citizen

Badger cull ‘sabs’ from Hackney have travelled to the heart of the countryside where government marksmen are engaged in shooting the animals.

Some cull saboteurs have been living at ‘Camp Badger’, an encampment in rural Somerset, for weeks and plan to stay until the start of next month.

They fear the cull in Somerset – one of two pilots being carried out over a period of six weeks – will kill 70 per cent of badgers in the area.

Lisa Brown, 32, from Clapton, said: “The shooters aim to kill 80 badgers a night for it to be successful. This cull can best be described as a badger genocide.”

Occupied Abenaki Lands Desecrated by 9/11 Memorial Protesters Intervene to Address U.S. Imperialism & Genocide

reposted from Indigenous Action Media

U.S. flag receptacle

Middlebury College, VT — At 3:00PM on Wednesday, September 11, 2013, five protesters removed thousands of flags desecrating occupied Abenaki lands. The U.S. flags were part of a 9/11 memorial established by Middlebury College students.

Amanda Lickers, a member of the Onondowa’ga Nation, states, “In the quickest moment of decision making, in my heart, I understood that lands where our dead may lay must not be desecrated. In my community, we do not pierce the earth. It disturbs the spirits there, it is important for me to respect their presence.”

“For over 500 years our people have been under attack. The theft of our territories, the devastation of our waters; the poisoning of our people through the poisoning of our lands; the theft of our people from our families; the rape of our children; the murder of our women; the sterilization of our communities; the abuse of generations; the uprooting of our ancestors and the occupation of our sacred sites; the silencing of our songs; the erasure of our languages and memories of our traditions. I have had enough.” stated Lickers.

Lickers was at the college to facilitate a workshop on Settler Responsibility and Decolonization.

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Massive Mine Proposed at Oak Flat, Sacred Tribal Land

San Carlos Apache Tribe says its spiritual beings reside here, off of Gaan Canyon

from AZStar

The planned Rosemont Copper Mine just south of Tucson isn’t the only mining controversy in Arizona.

It isn’t even the biggest.

About 100 miles north of Tucson, Resolution Copper Mining wants to build a mine in Superior, a town of 2,800 people, that could yield 1 billion pounds of copper a year. That’s more than four times the projected output for Rosemont Copper’s planned mine in the Santa Rita Mountains, which would produce an estimated 243 million pounds of copper annually.

Wharton Coal Prep Plant Spill Turns Boone County, WV River White

By Alanna Autler / WOWK-TV

The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection confirmed that a chemical spill from Eastern Associated Coal, a Patriot subsidiary, turned a river off Pond Fork Rd. in Wharton a milky shade of white.

More than 2,000 gallons of a white substance, called DT-50-D, spilled into the river after a spill that occurred some time after 10 p.m. Sept. 4.

The substance is generally used as a suppressant to cover coal and rail cars to cut down on the dust they can spread. Its consistency has the appearance of milky latex.

“It’s Not the Saints Who Can Bring Us the Sinners”: Sex Offender Outed as $90,000 Snitch in Pacific Northwest Activist Scene

The many faces of pedophile snitch Robert Joe Childs

from Earth First! Newswire

A repeat sex offender named Robert Joe Childs has been outed as an FBI and Seattle Police Department informant infiltrating activist groups in the Pacific Northwest, including Salish CIRCA. He has been reported seen in Portland, Oregon, and Puyallup, Washington.

While details about the cases of his sexual assault convictions are unknown at this time, Childs’s sex offender status explains a few of the likelihoods: “[offenders] may not know their victim(s). The crime may show a manifest cruelty to the victim(s) and these offenders usually deny or minimize the crime”

Born around 1976, Robert Joe Childs led a relatively off-the-map until March 3, 1995. He was 22, and he had just been convicted of his first sexual assault: Rape in the Third Degree, in other words, forced, coercive sex. Two years later, he was convicted of his second and third offences: Child molestation in the third degree and failure to register as a sex offender. Convicted for sexual assault again no more than four years later, Childs was just 25, and he had three felony sexual assault convictions in the span of just over six years. The next time we see Childs is just ten years later, and he is working for the FBI.

Web of Life Unravelling, Wildlife Biologist Says

Barn Swallows on a limb / naturevancouver.ca

By Brian Wilford / Oceanside Star

Wildlife biologist Neil Dawe says he wouldn’t be surprised if the generation after him witnesses the extinction of humanity.

All around him, even in a place as beautiful as the Little Qualicum River estuary, his office for 30 years as a biologist for the Canadian Wildlife Service, he sees the unravelling of “the web of life.”

“It’s happening very quickly,” he says.

Wyoming Wild Horse Herds in Jeopardy

Cross Posted from Straight From the Horses Heart

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) announced public meetings to be held in Rock Springs (Sept. 11) and Rawlins, WY (Sept. 12) to discuss removing all wild horses from the private and public lands of the Wyoming checkerboard.

“Press releases issued by the BLM have been confusing to say the least,” says GingerKathrens, Executive Director of The Cloud Foundation.  Press releases dated August 16^th and 27^th state that BLM agreed to remove all wild horses from the Rock Spring Grazing Association’s (RSGA) private lands. However, the Federal Register Announcement clearly states the scoping notice is to consider the environmental effects of revising the Resource Management Plans (RMP’s) for the Rock Springs and Rawlins Field offices by considering managing the Salt Wells Creek (572 horses), the Great Divide Basin (439 horses) herds for zero wild horses, changing the Adobe Town (433 horses) herd’s Appropriate Management Level (AML) to 225 horses, and managing the White Mountain (205 horses) herd as a non-reproducing herd: eliminating 46% of the wild horses in Wyoming.

WIRT Newsletter: September Events

Cross Posted from WIRT

Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and allied activists have invited hundreds of tribal and non-tribal friends, students, and supporters in north central Idaho, the Treasure Valley, and beyond to the following events.  Please participate and contact WIRT at wild.idaho.rising.tide@gmail.com and/or 208-301-8039 to arrange carpools from the Moscow/Pullman area to Bellingham, Boise, Helena, and Lapwai.