on the day of this interview the small creek less than one mile from their home flows black and i it's not normal that's coming from an abandoned home on drugs come from sorry pot. and i don't know. what to expect in all caught. maybe a few more years ma law. and my health this went down tremendously. and i don't ever look to be helpful as i don't have all of the signs not bankers in vain i can do to help me. that are only thing i want now i want a good moral i want them to quit the pump and are quitting jade and whatever they're doing i want them to quit that. and. it's all mob to me better. for the last twenty years.

it's been hard. you can't make it without good water. from the moody. blues. currently there are over one hundred forty billion gallons of coal slurry contained in more than one hundred pound mints in west virginia alone the total quantity of coal slurry in the rest of southern appalachians. on december twenty second two thousand and eight a coal ash impoundment at the tennessee valley authorities kingston fossil plant failed when an earthen dike broke spilling over one point one billion gallons of coal ash sludge over three hundred acres. coal ash sludge because waste created from the burning of coal at the kingston coal plant is believed to contain toxic compounds including arsenic and mercury. the

tennessee valley authority estimates the cost of the cleanup over eight hundred twenty five million dollars this spill is ten times larger than the exxon valdez spill in alaska and is believed to be america's largest environmental disaster to date with throwing away the next generation's most valuable resource and that is water and one of the best sources of water anywhere in the world and maybe the best source of fresh water in proximity to one of the world's largest fastest growing populations. you know with all the and all the lawsuits and all the carrying on that goes on in the in the press and you know the vanity fair's and in the u.s. news and world reports and all at that where the authors are warning people to believe that that we're absolutely strip in appalachia down to nothing. in order to get the mineral is patently untrue it's patently untrue when you look around at the

forested mountains that we have a recent environmental impact statement from the e.p.a. estimates over eight hundred square miles of mountains have already been destroyed this includes the permanent destruction of over four hundred fifty individual mountain summits across the region the report also indicates the permanent loss of over twelve hundred miles of mountain streams. although federal regulations for mine reclamation require that mountaintop removal sites be returned to their original contour these mines are routinely granted wavers mined areas are typically graded and then hydro seeded with less bodies or grass which clings to the compacted shale and rock that now makes up the topsoil nature builds soil for free but she creates the soil very slowly and so you're talking about thousands of years to go from something like a rock mass that has essentially no soil raised to very thin covering up to

generate a few centimeters of soil you're talking about hundreds to thousands and tens of thousands of years continuing at its present rate the projected loss from mountaintop removal mining is one point four million acres in the next decade an area equal in size to the state of delaware. by the summer of two thousand and six and wiley has formulated a new plan for pennies a promise. our government or a local school board state school board will do it in a way it shows and you know and parents and grandparents it's up to you to get this job for the kids you know we're going to money for schools one way or another. like we do school in our community and. it's it's showing that our government should come to this and we can't get nothing done for children . the.

we're going to watch the charleston west virginia worship do you see you all know this is the rise awareness and raise money for no shoulder and it also opens a lot of doors of applying to chapman in our communities as far as mountaintop removal what it's doing to those in in in the mining industry to our communities this is a perfectly viable one what it's actually doing to our children the governor made a statement our kids are our future by our tomorrow he should die almost up and for our jihad on march fourth don't have them all. live at least for the. burning of coal is or over a century has been one of the most deadly things that and humans have done it through the air around them even after one hundred years of burning coal and after one hundred years of so-called improvement of air quality according to the american

lung association twenty four thousand people a year still die prematurely from air pollution from coal plants in the united states almost forty percent of the carbon dioxide emissions come from coal one of the things that has to happen. that the politicians the leaders of the administration as well as congress state legislators and administrations in the states all those leaders have got to finally say ok we want to call in the two thousand election and west virginia was widely credited with giving. president bush the margin he needed to take the oval office was the first time the west virginia had gone republican in something like seventy years and guess what's going to happen come november we're going to carry the state of west virginia thank. the callers he was widely credited for giving bush west virginia so it was no secret

that he had a large debt to pay to the coal industry and they made sure he paid it throughout mine safety throughout the rollback of regulations on dirty power plants through a variety of places he essentially stocked all the regulatory agencies with with former coal industry lobbyists or executives by two thousand and one the bush administration made a swipe wording changing the clean water act designating waste as bill this wording change cleared the way for the expansion of mountaintop removal mining throughout southern appalachians. on january twenty second of two thousand and two president bush returned to west virginia it is such a wonderful day for us and for west virginia to host a special me in with those with a special bond to our state ladies and gentlemen the president of the united states i'm. we can do

a better job in america one of these days we're going to be driving you know automobiles that are fueled differently and that's going to be exciting times for america and which is new technologies coming down and we can encourage those technologies so conservation. take a logical development got to be an integral part of energy. folks we need more supply you know work well i can back here in the back and i said i'm real repairing a machine that digs for go we need to use coal we got a lot of it and we need to make sure that we. wait around. for the past twenty years larry gibson and his family have been fighting to preserve their ancestral home place on kafer down outside charleston west virginia and when i met with a cold coming to my property here me and my family members and they tell me that we

don't give a damn about people who carry cholera we don't give a damn about the people on top of that mountain all we care about is profit we are making and it was the dollar it was our body and the. know we were playing there and it is the vice president cultural production in eugene kids from mexico one thousand nine hundred three told me this gibson created the stanley errors foundation refusing to sell his family's fifty plus acres to coal companies before mountaintop removal began his family cemetery was surrounded by mountain ridges today the family cemetery looks out on reclaimed mountaintop removal sites eighteen years ago when i came back and it took me four years a clear left family a cemetery and in ninety nine to now on the third a restful and eighteen go when i started this i couldn't get to people to listen now even my own family. now you know have i turned

a corner how crest of the knob one day or that was there was before the snowy there in my own mind. or just for. the young kids of the day were never seen where i've seen the young as of the day were never seen the mountains the earth. no arraignments no brown before you could roam. gibson uses the land of capered mountain to educate the public about the effects of mountaintop removal one of the biggest questions people asked me if i had a picture of the mountain before was destroyed. here paperno why should you take a picture of a mountain for it's going to be here forever. day by day the seventy five hundred acres of active mountaintop removal mine continue to encircle his property. another family cemetery sits across the ridge on the active mine site although regulations require that family members have access to these cemeteries requests

are often not he's lee granted. on memorial day of two thousand and six gibson and a group of supporters make a trip to the cemetery they want a day we're going to go on the mine site at the cemetery over there and we get to how long around and different things going on and. it's destroy me a safe. zone and probably account for it to get to comb even under a graveyard. after filling out a den of occasion and release forms the group is permitted to enter the mine site in a one and a half mile hike to the family cemetery. i . didn't mention and just sign a release to go visit my family to be. heard it's with you. the first

waterhole i respond then and my life was up then how on the water hole is not there now we've got a seven six seven hundred foot high wall there now. my mama give me birth he's not in the light. well. you can get to the cemetery through their color as your round. they used to be a road over here. five. one right here. over here is another one here want i hear. your people are taking part in history this land december third been here for two hundred seventy years and never had this many people on it in the last hundred fifty years and i stand not doubt to come through here they wouldn't or gentleness or kind the sense we've got a minister here i'll tell you what else they said to ny. nj and these people flame

beneath these graves the first time when julian come here four years ago we had kate stone who had dates on him they're no longer here if they hadn't been saying that we came and got him. and it's not the case and the words are down is going to say alan johnson want to say is we're just not been heard here for alone long long time in mid august of two thousand and six the west virginia department of environmental protection revoked a permit to massey energy to expand its plant and marsh fork elementary by building a second coal silo the d.p. determined that the second coal silo was placed outside the permitted boundary of three hundred feet from the school after maps of the preparation plant were found to be an accurate.

oh. nobody would stand up. stand up to. our flight. tomorrow. and i will and i will by an hour. get something done for. our sleep going to. sleep. how.

how. how. how. well you know. as many as i have along the way. we've raised a little money for the new school when they. come here and hopefully. sandberg and i feel that we have conflict all three of them and i believe this call for a lot of doors for a lot of people on this issue. though is very important for me to walk on march

fourteenth two thousand and seven the state board of surface mining overturned a west virginia department of environmental protections ruling that denied massey energy a permit to build a second coal silo behind the school this decision cleared the way for the expansion of massey energy's coal processing facility two days later a coalition of citizen conservation groups including mountain just a summer activists returned to west virginia governor joe manchin is office. thank. you. for her for her. and nailed thirty three years for the rights of those children that i see it's

raining how sad right now are saying well tell her of the flood stay and serve it. does that mean anything to you we prayed for you all for three years and seven never missed an early release the people in these capital cities to be held accountable for. what i want to ask you to do you know what i'm going to do back to back corner we need to clear this way because people are going to get back for your . loser him or her will clearly for her. because we were here a new school after one year broke your own playing here i'm telling you we are not budging there's more coming god.

whisper around my ear get this right now what they're offering their field will no . more meeting a whisper in the air while it is right now we want results today we want our kids. to. share. why it is our kids there. are girls day in the coal field. they're on their own found them i don't. know we are the cradle they bring their money out them out. farmer where you get they took care of us are still our children. before the state can get involved in this you such as whether school should be the new school should be built a decision post first we have to look. i've heard the local school board with the decision on a new school that march forward before i go to the people of raleigh. so they can

determine the final outcome from themselves so i'm going to join me. now or could i hope that the. various members. you. can hear because you. may say. people. are still here who. are organized.

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