Friends- some of you may not be aware of this, but these brave young people have been treesitting on Coal River Mtn for about a week now, putting up with freezing temps, loud horn noisemakers kept on all night to try to make them leave the trees, lack of food because resupply efforts have been halted etc. -- here's the main website that you can find the updates on:
Climate Ground Zero
A few of you i'm writing to have even sat in trees for forest protection yourself in the past, or supported such actions, and now is the time to step up and support *these* courageous folks for the fight of this moment, the effort to save beautiful mountain ranges in Appalachia from being blown up into rubble, to get in the cheapest way what amounts to only 5% of the US supply of coal (of course, i don't really support coal mining anyway, but at least subsurface mining using individual miners creates more jobs, and leaves the Earth's surface intact, and a majority of WV residents oppose MTR, as well).
Blowing up the mtns also totally eliminates the possibility of making windfarms on these mtns for long-term sustainable energy -- you can find more on this here:
I Love Mountains
Anti-MTR (Mountain Top Removal Coal Mining) actions have been ramping up over the last year, but as far as i know, this is the first one where people are actually sitting in trees long-term, putting themselves at such risk to stop this.
We can end this terrible rape of the Earth within a short timescale if we all put our hearts into it. it's the env'l issue i've cared most about in recent times.
I just called the Climate Ground Zero hdqrtrs at: 304-854-7372, and got patched through to a person (Guin) who apparently was even out at Redwood Summer in 1990, knows both Darryl Cherney and David Solnit, two long-time activist friends of mine, and said what they really desperately need is bail money for the treesitters if and when they come down (link is right on their site) and also directed me to Scott Parkin at RAN (Rainforest Action Network , ran.org) because they also have a major anti-MTR campaign going on.
I've already supported this action with $ and petitions over the last week, and am glad to hear that at least the Gov of WV, Manchin, under pressure, has ambivalently stopped the use of the noisemakers against the treesitters, see:
West Virginia Gazette
But we really need to do *much* more to get people to realize what these people are sacrificing and the risk they're putting themselves in order to protect the mountains of Appalachia, our common heritage.
I hope you will step up and support these folks somehow, pass this on -- so that their statement is the loudest possible, and we can *stop* the destruction of Coal River Mountain, and ultimately, shut down MTR mining.
The Appalachian Mountains thank you--
Climate Ground Zero
A few of you i'm writing to have even sat in trees for forest protection yourself in the past, or supported such actions, and now is the time to step up and support *these* courageous folks for the fight of this moment, the effort to save beautiful mountain ranges in Appalachia from being blown up into rubble, to get in the cheapest way what amounts to only 5% of the US supply of coal (of course, i don't really support coal mining anyway, but at least subsurface mining using individual miners creates more jobs, and leaves the Earth's surface intact, and a majority of WV residents oppose MTR, as well).
Blowing up the mtns also totally eliminates the possibility of making windfarms on these mtns for long-term sustainable energy -- you can find more on this here:
I Love Mountains
Anti-MTR (Mountain Top Removal Coal Mining) actions have been ramping up over the last year, but as far as i know, this is the first one where people are actually sitting in trees long-term, putting themselves at such risk to stop this.
We can end this terrible rape of the Earth within a short timescale if we all put our hearts into it. it's the env'l issue i've cared most about in recent times.
I just called the Climate Ground Zero hdqrtrs at: 304-854-7372, and got patched through to a person (Guin) who apparently was even out at Redwood Summer in 1990, knows both Darryl Cherney and David Solnit, two long-time activist friends of mine, and said what they really desperately need is bail money for the treesitters if and when they come down (link is right on their site) and also directed me to Scott Parkin at RAN (Rainforest Action Network , ran.org) because they also have a major anti-MTR campaign going on.
I've already supported this action with $ and petitions over the last week, and am glad to hear that at least the Gov of WV, Manchin, under pressure, has ambivalently stopped the use of the noisemakers against the treesitters, see:
West Virginia Gazette
But we really need to do *much* more to get people to realize what these people are sacrificing and the risk they're putting themselves in order to protect the mountains of Appalachia, our common heritage.
I hope you will step up and support these folks somehow, pass this on -- so that their statement is the loudest possible, and we can *stop* the destruction of Coal River Mountain, and ultimately, shut down MTR mining.
The Appalachian Mountains thank you--