Secwepemc Plan Mt. Polley Protest
Williams Lake, B.C. – A protest will mark the two-year anniversary of the Mt. Polley tailings pond breach this Thursday.
Organizers are calling it a “resistance gathering” and it’s been organized by the Secwepemc Women’s Warrior Society. It’s in response to the provincial government’s decision to issue a full operating permit to mine operators Imperial Metals in June.
The action began last night with a dinner and presentation on the mine in Vancouver and tomorrow it will continue with a bus and convoy of private vehicles that will travel to a camp set up at the Mount Polley mine entrance for the protest on Thursday.
“We’re calling on indigenous people and activists, allies, supporters and people that are really concerned about our water and salmon to come out and stand in solidarity with us,” says Kanahus Freedom of the Secwepemc Women’s Warrior Society and one of the organizers of the resistance gathering.
“It’s been two years after the Mt. Polley Mine disaster and there’s still no sufficient or meaningful cleanup that’s taken place.”
She continues: “The province has no jurisdiction to be issuing permits to companies illegally operating on our Sovereign Territories without the free, prior, informed consent of the Secwepemc Tribal Peoples.”
Freedom, who is based out of the southern part of the Secwepemc territory near Shuswap Lake, says its an issue that affects all 17 bands covering their land.
“We’re talking about a common area, a collective use area for the Secwepemc people. Quesnel Lake is the largest, deepest, glacier bed lake in the world, and is a very culturally and spiritually significant area not just for the northern Secwepemc people but for the entire Secwepemc nation.”
Is the entire Secwepemc nation united in the rally?
“You have to look at Canada too. Is Canada all united on this issue? One thing that I could say is that we are all united in the protection of our water. We all understand we need water to survive?”
Comments
Hello you folks are driving there, now just where do you think all the materials that make up your vehicals come from. Um think mining.
By the way luckily what disaster?
“By the way luckily what disaster?”
The Mount Polley mine disaster is an environmental disaster in the Cariboo region of central British Columbia, Canada, that began 4 August 2014 with a breach of the Imperial Metals-owned Mount Polley copper and gold mine tailings pond, releasing its water and slurry with years worth of mining waste into Polley Lake. The spill flooded Polley Lake, its outflow Hazeltine Creek, and continued into nearby Quesnel Lake and Cariboo River. By 8 August the four square kilometres sized tailings pond was empty. Water tests showed elevated levels of selenium, arsenic and other metals similar to historical tests before the disaster. The cause of the dam break has been investigated with a final report published 31 January 2015. Imperial Metals had a history of operating the pond beyond capacity since at least 2011.
Well the area is growing over.
“Water tests showed elevated levels of selenium, arsenic and other metals similar to historical tests before the disaster” What do you mean by that? What elevated levels there were was soon dissipated and posed no issue because of dilution. Arsenic was almost non-existent in the pond before the spill.
Luckily there was no habitation below the spill and in ten years there will be almost no evidence of the spill.
The spill has been studied and where are the red flags? Lots of irrational emotion but no facts.
Why did they bother with a settling pond if, according to you, it would have been just as easy to not other with one and just let it run steadily into the creek? After all, you seem to think that given enough time things will grow over and the waste in the mill effluent is practically harmless to flora and fauna, which includes us, homo sapiens.
“By 8 August the four square kilometres sized tailings pond was empty.”
Not sure where you get your info from but it was not “empty”
PrinceGeorge, you suggest that the tailings pond was empty. Hardly!
I’m not a miner and I’ve never been involved in the mineral mining industry, but it seems to me that the tailing pond didn’t empty! Rather the liquids and slurry in the upper levels of the pond drained out, leaving behind the vast majority of rock flour that was produced in the mining process, rock flour that had settled out in the tailings pond. In order to extract the copper and gold from rock, the rock is pulverized and ground to a flour like consistency in order to separate out and extract the copper and gold.
So, contrary to your comment, the tailing pond didn’t empty, only the upper most fluids drained out with some of the slurry, leaving the vast majority of the settled out rock flour in the tailings pond. That also should explain to you why they even bothered to put in place a tailings pond, or as you said a settling pond!
But, I could be wrong! After all, I’m not a miner!
Typical black or white ideology by seamutt. Who says these protesters are against mining? Is there anything wrong with driving their cars and trucks to a protest that draws the mining industry’s attention to operating their mines in an environmentally responsible manner? Is there anything wrong with these protesters drawing government attention to the need to have regulations and enforcement in place that not only protects the local environments around mining operations, but also protects the health and safety of those living in the vicinity of those mines?
Finally, what is it of your concern how they get to a protest, if it serves to promote awareness of all these things, without being “anti-mining”? Typical simplistic thinking by the low IQ crowd!!!
JGalt, oh my, feel better now!
Now read the article again, this time slowly for comprehension.
Name calling quite mature!
You have your opinion, others have theirs. Why is it you always call people names and put them down if they think differently than you?
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