Following their annual week-long Round River Rendezvous, occurring this year in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny National Forest, Earth First! activists from across the United States successfully shut down a hydraulic fracturing site in the nearby Moshannon State Forest. The action on Sunday, July 8, marked the first time protesters have managed to shut down a hydrofracking site in the U.S. The blockade is part of an escalating direct action campaign in Pennsylvania, led by groups like Marcellus Earth First! and Occupy Well Street, who are targeting the so-called “fracking” industry. The campaign most recently included the 12-day blockade from June 1 to June 13 of the Riverdale Mobile Home Park in Jersey Shore, Pa., by residents and activists.
Roughly 100 people disrupted work on the fracking site by blocking the only access road to the location with tree-sitters, who stopped all traffic on the road by stringing anchor ropes across the length of it; any vehicle coming through the anchor lines would have put the lives of the tree-sitters at risk. They were defended on the north and south by piles of logs and debris, forming barricades that stretched for a mile and a half. About an hour into the blockade, workers on the site were approached by 20 or so activists, who informed them that the site was closed to vehicular traffic indefinitely. They offered to safely escort workers across the barricades on foot, or on rented ATVs, and assured them that their target was the fracking industry, not the workers. After confirming that the site and its 70-foot tall drill rig were indeed shut down for the day, the Earth First!ers headed back to the road to reinforce their blockades.
Most of the blockades were fortified to be about four feet tall and stretch across the entire road. Shifts were set up to watch them, and individuals or affinity groups took on roles like worker and police liaisons, media, communications, medics, water and food runners, and legal observers. Locals stopped by throughout day, expressing their support for the action against the fracking industry and walking around the barricaded roadway, mingling with activists.
As nightfall approached, police began to move in. Bulldozers cleared out the barricades leading from the road’s entrance to the locations where the tree sitters were camped out. One activist, who had U-locked their neck to an anchor line strung across the road to protect a tree-sitter, was sliced out with bolt cutters and arrested. After carelessly slashing safety lines away from the person in a hammock 50 feet up between the trees, putting their life in imminent danger, the police snatched them with a fire department hook-and-ladder truck. After determining that the truck could not reach the second tree-sitter, they sliced all the safety lines, leaving the sitter hostage 70 feet up in the sky, and then left the location. The second tree-sitter, however, had hidden an extra rope inside a bucket in the tree, and was able to climb down and escape without arrest once the officers had left. By the end of the day, Earth First! had contributed its direct-action muscle to the growing momentum of a local campaign and showed the fracking industry what to expect in the future if it keeps tearing Pennsylvania communities apart.
Hydraulic fracturing is a process in which pressurized fluid is blasted into a shale, forcing it to release natural gas. The process results in forest fragmentation, contamination of groundwater and risks to air quality. While fracking is a relativity new process, people living near extraction sites or compressor stations have reported various neurological and respiratory effects such as asthma, arsenic poisoning, cancer and more. Some report being able to light their drinking water on fire due to contamination. Gas companies, however, have thus far not been forced to release information detailing the exact nature of the mixture of toxic chemicals used in the process.
Earth First! is a radical environmental direct action movement founded in 1980. It currently operates under anarchist principles, making decisions by consensus and organizing non-hierarchically. Autonomous EF! groups can be formed anywhere in the world by activists who identify with these principles, and with Earth First!’s slogan “No Compromise in Defense of Mother Earth!” Earth First! members have employed such tactics as tree sits, road blockades, tripods, and locking themselves to or otherwise disrupting heavy machinery. These tactics have often won them major victories, most recently by Humboldt Earth First! in California, where 2,000 acres of forest in the McKay Tract were saved after a four-year tree-sitting campaign.
Earth First!’s annual meet-up is a weeklong series of workshops, skillshares, performances and relationship-building that occurs in a different part of the country every year, designed to contribute to a local direct action campaign. This year’s rendezvous attracted a harmonious mixture of urban and rural activists. The potential for growth, sharing and solidarity between urban and rural activism was palpable throughout the week.
Experienced rural activists set up a training center open all week to help teach tactics like climbing and tree-sits. There were courses on constructing and implementing tripods and bipods, which are temporary structures that leave activists towering above the ground and prevent vehicular passage underneath them, and hard locks, in which activists use equipment to attach their bodies to things like heavy machinery, road intersections or entrances to corporate buildings. A course on “Diesel Mechanics in Case of Zombie Apocalypse” was particularly well-attended. Imagine a person or two in an 80-foot tall tripod blocking vehicular traffic on Broadway in New York City, and it becomes clear how these tactics could be well-applied to urban settings as well as rural ones.
The urban activists, in turn, shared their experience with anti-oppression work. Unlearning internalized oppressions like racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, ageism and the like has long been a focus of the urban anarchist movement. This year’s Earth First! rendezvous placed a clear priority on the work of challenging patriarchy. There were two “Female-Identified, Queer and Trans Listening Circles,” designed to create a safe space for systemically-marginalized folks to discuss their experiences. There were two “Fighting Male Supremacy” workshops attended by about 50 people who identified as males, and who discussed the role patriarchy plays in their lives, and how to challenge male supremacy in all its forms. Additionally, one of the best-attended workshops of the weekend was called “Challenging Racism in our Movements.” The next issue of the Earth First! Journal will be focused on anti-oppression work in the movement and society at large.
Bringing the Earth First! Rendezvous to Pennsylvania will give a boost to the campaigns of local direct action groups working to end hydrofracking in the Marcellus Shale region. It put the fracking industry on notice with the first successful fracking site shutdown in the United States, with many more to come. Also, many urban activists are now trained in advanced civil disobedience tactics that their rural counterparts have developed, and which can now spread and be applied in new contexts. The growing strength and momentum of the anti-fracking movement, coupled with remarkable solidarity and synergy between urban and rural activism, provide further evidence that a wave of resistance is sweeping the United States and the world.
Can you share some picture ¿?
Thanks for the inspiration !!
Check out Marcellus Earth First!s Flickr photostream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/82273234@N03/
Wow. Such courage and tenacity! Blessings on all of their heads.
I was curious as to what the resource reserves were when they started, and how much is the estimation of now much was left? Was it a political move, and they didn’t stand much to lose, because most had been extracted already. Excellent work on everything by the way. I just try to think as they might, if you would let me know.
Great strategic questions. We should always be thinking about what our real impact is. In this case, though, it may be that the symbolic victory of shutting down the site, and experimenting with tactics for doing so, is enough.
Heya William,
Awesome questions, thanks.
This frack site is brand new. When completely up and running, it will be one of the largest in Pennsylvania. It contains 9 separate well permits (only 1 open so far, more were scheduled to start this week), a 75-foot drill rig (many EF! activists were saying this was the biggest rig they had ever seen) and shutting it down for a day, and delaying the full opening of the site cost the company millions.
Additionally, fracking companies will almost certainly increase their security across the board in PA now, costing them tons more money and putting them on constant notice for further disruptions. The more expensive and difficult we make this process for them, the more likely they are to stop.
Had not seen reports of this elsewhere — the bit about the cut lines is alarming. I like this–the anti-fracking folks could learn a lot from E.F. “…This year’s Earth First! rendezvous placed a clear priority on the work of challenging patriarchy. There were two “Female-Identified, Queer and Trans Listening Circles,” designed to create a safe space for systemically-marginalized folks to discuss their experiences. There were two “Fighting Male Supremacy” workshops attended by about 50 people who identified as males, and who discussed the role patriarchy plays in their lives, and how to challenge male supremacy in all its forms. …”. They are amazing!
Heya Lisa
To be honest, don’t give EF! too much credit for this type of work. They’re talking about it, and it was definitely among the most vibrant topics of discussion at the Rondy all week, but it’s still a super masculine, patriarchal space. A lot of people I love and respect were super uncomfortable there….
Hoping they continue to work on it, but don’t mistake the fact that they’re talking about their issues with actually being a safer space at the moment, and I’m sorry if I gave the impression that it was.
In the past 15 years of involvement with the Earth First! movement, i’ve seen it, and participated in it, working hard to understand and confront internal issues of patriarchy in a deep and sincere way. The biggest challenge i see to that work succeeding more is the high turn over rate (this is true for the movement in general).
From what i can tell, making safer spaces is much more about knowing and trusting the people around you than it is about having an impeccable anti-oppression policy with “mandatory” workshops. That means sticking around through the hard stuff, even if it is uncomfortable at times (that goes mostly for the white guys out there…not just with being challenged, but also with being imperfect and willing to process without casting judgement on the others around you.)
Oh, and it seems a bit more sobriety could help too. Its hard to move forward when people are too hung over to make it to morning circle.
Overall, thanks for this great article, and for following up with constructive discussion.
We as free people must not pull back from seeking the truth and consistency in any plans concerning our race, the planet and its species.
If we look at the world, we are all sharing it as the whole, the one, and, at present, there is no other.
The bottom line is, you cannot get off.
It is each and everyone’s responsibility to ensure that industry, Governments and corporate’s do not destroy the environment and species any more.
There are no excuses for the wanton destruction of the planet, it’s species and habitats to date.
You/we/I have only to look to see the massive environmental damage that big companies and governments have already created with their insatiable greed and their need for cash, control of people, energy and resources.
The truth is they must be stopped from destroying any further.
Alternative energy is not a fantasy, there is an inexhaustible amount of information readily available.
Conservation of energy must also be fully realized, utilized and practiced.
Do not be fooled into thinking bio fuels, or hydro electric dams are an answer.
They serve no sustainable purpose, resulting once again in the destruction of habitats and the displacement of wildlife and indigenous people’s.
As a race, we must not allow any to destroy our environment.
We must not allow corporate, industry, or regimes to force us to be separated from interacting with our environment.
Nuclear power is a demon seed with nuclear waste having a half life of 25,000 years.
This means that it will still be 100% toxic to all forms of cellular life in 25,000 years time.
Chernobyl in Russia and Fukushima in Japan has shown that no nuclear power plants are 100% safe, and once an accident happens, the species and environmental impact is both far reaching and devastating.
People must pluck the sickness of greed and corruption from their Nations
You only get one chance, make that chance, one of a future for all People, species and planet.
Chris, this piece rocks and is so inspiring! Thanks for keeping us informed about such important actions!
Hi Chris,
We are doing a show called Occupy Public Access TV and we have a story on your action. Is it alright if we use your photos on the show?
Hey James,
The photos aren’t mine, but I imagine it would be no problem at all. I would say just use the ones that were publicly released at http://www.flickr.com/photos/82273234@N03/
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