The Height of Human Hubris
If there’s a pinnacle of human hubris, it’s got to be mountaintop removal. If you’re not familiar with this shockingly destructive method of coal mining, let me direct you to one of the best and most moving pieces of creative nonfiction I’ve read in recent years, Erik Reece’s 2005 article, Death of a Mountain, which was originally published by Harper’s Magazine and expanded into his 2006 book, Lost Mountain.
In Death of a Mountain, Reece begins by describing a 2003 visit to Lost Mountain:
I notice that a fire tower standing here a year ago has been blown or torn from its foundation and sent crashing down the ridge side. But even without the tower’s perspective, looking off to the north I can see thousands of acres - former summits - that have been flattened by mountaintop mining. Where once there were jagged, forested ridgelines, now there is only a series of plateaus, staggered grey shelves where grass struggles to grow in crushed rock and shale.
Reece goes on to summarize the impact of mountaintop removal :
the Environmental Protection Agency estimates that more than 700 miles of healthy streams have been buried by mountaintop removal - some say the number is twice that - and hundreds more have been damaged. Blasting on the mine sites has cracked the foundations of nearby homes and polluted hundreds of family wells. Creeks run orange with sulfuric acid and heavy metals. Wildlife populations have been summarily dispersed. An entire ecosystem has been dismantled.
Over the course of a year, Reece follows the process of the removal of the top of Lost Mountain. We follow the wrenching process with him, watching as the top of the mountain is dumped into the valley below, and end up standing with him where the top of the mountain used to be, looking at the wreckage around and below the scene of the crime. I don’t want to ruin the emotional impact of this piece by quoting the parts that made me cry. Read it for yourself.
This remarkable piece of environmental reportage came to mind because I read in the latest Earth First Journal that anti-mountaintop removal activist Maria Gunnoe and her children have been under siege by coal company employees who say things to her like, “It’s odd sometimes how houses just catch on fire and people die in them.” Her fears are not unfounded. Another West Virginia anti-mining activist was burned out of her home in 1999. Gunnoe is raising money for home security. Donations may be sent to POB 46, Bob White, WV, 25028.
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February 2nd, 2008 at 11:21 pm
“It’s odd sometimes how houses just catch on fire and people die in them.â€
And the US government probably has a dossier on Ms. Gunnoe as opposed to Big Coal…you know, the real “terraists.”