An Important Message From Bill McKibben

Yesterday 400,000 people from all around the country and the world marched in New York city.  It was a great day!

The Ethics of Fracking

Published on Jan 14, 2014

A film by Scott Cannon http://www.gdacoalition.org

This film explores the ethics of fracking though different professional and religious backgrounds. It also takes a look at the deceiving advertising the gas industry heavily relies on. It is for educational purposes only. If any groups would like a DVD or to host a screening of the film, they can request one by email at videoinnovation@epix.net

Acknowledgements for their participation in the film:
Bernard G. Prusak - Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the McGowan Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility at King's College

Congressman Matt Cartwright - Pennsylvania's 17th Congressional District

Brother David Andrews, C.S.C. - Senior Representative of Food & Water Watch

Rabbi Mordechai Liebling - Director of the Social Justice Organizing Program at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College

Marleen A. Troy, Ph. D. - Associate Professor of Environmental Engineering, Wilkes University

Dr. Alfonso Rodriguez, MD - Nephrologists, President of the Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition

Healing: Thinking of Fracking and Mother Earth

In honor of Vera Scroggins, photojournalist and documentarian, a tour de force, and a wonderful human being.   I thought of her when I saw this picture.

Fracking: Mr. President, Please Come To PA To See For Yourself

Please watch and share this video. Then take action!
http://TinyURL.com/MessageToObamaFromVera
1: Share it. 2: Contact the Whitehouse. Message:
President Obama ...please watch "Message From Vera in Pennsylvania" on Youtube channel Shaleshock.
Whitehouse Switchboard (202-456-1414) public comment line (202-456-1111)


http://youtu.be/yRcEG78TV9M

New Pipeline: Silver Lake Township, Susquehanna County, PA

Published on May 21, 2013
Taped 5-20-13. I was coming home yesterday from a funeral and saw this on the road to my home in my township. Ground broken open, trees cut down, 100 ft. swatches cut open and scraped to the ground, mounds of earth dug up. Shocking for me and disturbing. More compressor stations will be coming besides the 21 being built and permitted right now in our county of Susquehanna, Pa.. More pipelines will be coming also. These pipelines connect the gas pads with multiple wells in my area, within a mile of my home.

Video by Vera Scroggins, Independent Journalist/Videographer

"Who'd have thought that people would allow this?"

A Beautiful Day In the Neighborhood?

Published on May 18, 2013

All this happening on Turnpike Rd., Brooklyn, Susquehanna County, Pa.. Flaring on the Teddick Gas Pad and see the fire damages at the Williams Compressor Station. I gave a Citizen Gas Tour for a group from NJ , who are with the Food and Water Watch Organization and they toured with their placard-decorated Anti-Frack Mobile....

From Vera Scroggins, Independent Media/Journalist

Anti-Fracking Mobile



Run! Run! Run!: A Letter From the Mayor of Dish, Texas

Our Family Summer Home in Bradford County, PA

"Run for your life! Run for the lives, health, safety and well-being of your family members and loved ones!  Run for the value of your estate!  There are billions of dollars under your feet, and people are coming to get it.  They do not care who or what they have to run over or through to get it.  It is an underground gold rush, with you or your property in the way."

"In September of 2011, I visited Ithaca, New York.  Two thoughts kept running through my mind in the several days I spent there.  One, I was glad to see this area up close before it gets destroyed.  Two, these people do not have any idea how much their world is about to change."

Read the entire letter here:

http://www.neogap.org/neogap/2012/07/08/the-flowback-the-costly-consequences-of-hydrofracking/

Oil Pipeline Bursts, Oil Flows Into Yellowstone River April 13

Latest news from Montana:  The ExxonMobil oil pipeline below the Yellowstone River burst late Friday night leaking oil into the river and contaminating the local waterway.

Alexis Bonogofsky, who lives on the river and has a farm,  said she could see, "birds trying to take off that couldn’t because of oil on their wings. I saw a spiny soft shell turtle dive into a glob of oil."

What did Exxon say to the property owner?  Exxon officials told Alexis that she should not document the effects the spill has on her property and that she should stay from the oil "just to be safe." They told her "off the record" that she should move her livestock away from the parts of the farm affected by the spill.

When is this nightmare going to end? Old pipelines are in need of replacement. They are failing, bursting, wreaking havoc. 

Read the horrifying story here.

Louis W. Allstadt On Gas Drilling In New York State and the SGEIS

Lou Allstadt discusses the enormous inadequacies of the New York State SGEIS. His talk can also be viewed here: www.otsego2000.org. For an excellent article on this topic, click HERE. Lou Allstadt is a former Mobil Oil Corp. executive. Initially a proponent of gas drilling, he now is "convinced the economic prospects are largely hype and that the state's environmental regulators are disturbingly unprepared to deal with the side effects of such an invasive industrial activity."

Bradford County (PA) Farmers Tell Their Tragic Story: The Sacrifice

Published on Aug 25, 2012 by veraduerga

Two women dairy farmers from Bradford County, Pa., tell their stories about life with gas drilling and fracking and all the problems they have encountered the past four years. Sponsored by Sharon Springs Against Fracking, with Bob Nied introducing them.

Dr.Sandra Steingraber narrates this slide show which tells the story of high-volume, slickwater, horizontal hydrofracking, a method of extracting tiny bubbles of natural gas from tight shale, in this case, the Marcellus Shale. In her quiet, sweet voice she describes what is happening under the ground, under our feet, and how this process is destroying our planet. Don't let her quiet voice deceive you. She is telling a devastating story that everyone should hear. This is a crisis of monumental proportions.

Summary: Author Sandra Steingraber, who is at the forefront of efforts to halt fracking across the Marcellus Shale deposits, reads excerpts from her essay about the fiftieth anniversary of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, accompanied by a full portfolio of fracking photos by Nina Berman.

A few comments from viewers: 1 Marc Mullinax on Aug 24, 2012 Last two minutes, with the author’s questions, are very powerful. They should be the same questions we pose to ourselves 2 Ellen Newton Duell on Aug 24, 2012 I am passionately devoted to preventing fracking and use of injection wells for fracking wastewater. Thank you for this excellent article. And deep gratitude to Rachel Carson. 3 joan meierotto on Aug 24, 2012 Very well done. Thank you Sandra and Rachel. 5 Angela Monti Fox, The Mothers Project on Aug 24, 2012 Thanks you Sandra for this wonderful piece that will help us all in providing another voice for this hydrofracking tragedy. An excellent teaching tool to help inform those who are still without real knowledge and truth. Angela Monti Fox 6 John Trallo on Aug 25, 2012 I mourn for my home state, Pennsylvania, the largest continuous stretch of forest land in North America, and for the future generations who will never know the asthetic beauty, pure water, clean air, and way of life that was once Pennsylvania. 7 cyril robinson on Aug 25, 2012 fracking is the pollution that Rachel Carson fought against and the way to remember her is to carry on her fight. We must think of her as ever-present urging us on as a figure likeJoan of Arc with her standard flying as she marches in front of this sacred environmental army. 8 Pauline Matt on Aug 25, 2012 Oh my, Nothing to say…just a deep hurtful cry.

Just a deep hurtful cry....

Loyalsock Creek Ruined by Pipeline Installation

Drilling "Accident" on Loyalsock Creek east of Worlds End State Park in Central Pa. Thank you Gov. Corbett, DEP, DCNR and the inept and Criminally Negligent Williams Co. and it's Contractors for fouling this pristine stream on Labor Day Weekend 2012!

Aerial Photos of Pennsylvania Gas Development

Aerial photographs of the natural gas exploration being done in and around the Pine Creek Valley in Central PA. Photos by Bill Crowell.

Orion Magazine: The Fracking of Rachel Carson

The latest issue of Orion Magazine is an excellent one. I highly recommend Sandra Steingraber's article, "The Fracking of Rachel Carson."  You will see poignant photographs and be treated to Dr. Steingraber's compelling style of expression.  She always draws me in from the first sentence.

To go to her article, click here.

Rachel Louise Carson
1907-1964

Luzerne County Mud Blowout: Pipeline Installation Accident

This drilling mud blowout is .2 miles behind Kunkle Motors of Route 309 in Dallas Township Pennsylvania.

Drilling blowout in Back Mountain

Published: May 8, 2012
The state Department of Environmental Protection is investigating a blowout at a natural gas pipeline installation near Leonards Creek in the Kunkle section of Dallas Township.

Chief Gathering LLC, which was recently bought out by PVR Partners, is laying a natural gas pipeline from wells in Susquehanna County to connect to the Transco interstate pipeline in Dallas.

The blowout occurred last week as contractors were boring beneath wetlands and some of the mud they were using blew out into the creek,  according to state Department of Environmental Protection Spokeswoman Colleen Connolly. She did not know how much mud got into the creek.

The mud is being sucked up with hay bales and a vacuum pump. Connolly said the mud will be tested to see what, if any, chemicals it contains. "It doesn't look like anything dangerous at this point, but we'll take a look and see," she said.
http://citizensvoice.com/news/drilling-blowout-in-back-mountain-1.1312313#axzz1uLCTYBWI

Natural Gas Exxposed

Natural Gas Exxposed tells the stories of Americans whose lives have been devastated by gas drilling.

All across the country, gas companies are poisoning water, tearing apart communities and destroying the American dream for thousands of families who can't protect their children from what comes out of the tap.

Please join us in rejecting this dangerous bridge to nowhere and working to build a renewable energy economy.

My Dear Susquehanna: French Azilum, PA

I know this landscape very well.  It is French Azilum in Bradford County.  If you look carefully, you can see the effects of the gas drilling industry. Well pads, water impoundments, frac water treatment facility.  They are all there in this snapshot.  And this is all just getting started.  What a sad story...one of the most precious places on earth for me is being invaded, yes, raped, by people who want the money.  My family summer home is being contaminated slowly but surely.  That's the Susquehanna River winding through this picture.  It is the most polluted river on the east coast already.

A family song we have been singing for decades goes like this:

Old Frenchtown, how we love the dear old name!

There's no other place can ever be to us the same.

Through this world we may wander up and down,

But always, we'll be coming back again to old Frenchtown.

Camp Hutchinson, French Azilum, PA
My sacred spot





SRBC: OM- We Honor the River

Another way we can honor the Susquehanna River and try to change the hearts and minds of the people who sit on the Susquehanna River Basin Commission. This Commission is not listening to the citizens of New York, Maryland, and New Jersey. When will they start listening?

Man charged in spill near PA gas-drilling site (With Update)

You can read all about it here. (There's a picture here which says it ALL.)

In essence, a Georgia man has admitted to PA State Police that he dumped approximately 800 gallons of dangerous materials from a Bradford County gas well site onto  state game lands early Thursday morning.  He now sits in a West Burlington correctional facility with bail set at $100,000.

The discovery was made by a man as he pulled out of his driveway and saw the pool of viscous black liquid.  It was described as a gooey, black material which was about 3 inches deep, covering approximately 100 X 30 feet.  The man who discovered the problem said he believes the liquid was dumped Wednesday night.

Tire tracks likely tell the story, he said. What it looks like to me is a tanker truck pulled out in there.  It looks to me like they were going to go out into a field and dump, and they got stuck, so they just dumped it there and just left.

This will be happening more and more in gas fields everywhere.

Latest Update:  (12/03/2011)
http://thedailyreview.com/news/cleanup-continues-of-dumped-sludge-in-state-gamelands-in-bradford-county-1.1240352

Is high-volume, slick water hydrofracking constitutional in PA?

Article I, section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution

Sec. 27. Natural Resources and the Public Estate

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania's public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.

This amendment, which was adopted in 1972, encompasses two basic principles. First, Pennsylvanians have a right to a decent environment, and second, Pennsylvania government has a trusteeship responsibility to protect that environment on behalf of future generations.

Is hydrofracking constitutional in PA?