A flotilla of kayak activists took to the waters of Seattle's Elliott Bay Sunday, calling for better safety regulations of oil barges in the Salish Sea and to block the Kinder Morgan's Puget Sound oil pipeline through Washington state.
About 30 "kayaktivists" with the group Mosquito Fleet surrounded a large oil barge near the Port of Seattle and held a large banner that read "Stop Kinder Morgan."
The group called the company's transportation of "tar sands" crude oil through Washington's waters "reckless," and called attention to the threat posed by their Trans Mountain Pipeline and Tanker Project. The group claims 900,000 barrels of crude oil would be delivered from Alberta to British Columbia daily, resulting in a 700% increase in oil tanker traffic through the Salish Sea to refiners in Washington state, California and overseas. The project has sparked opposition from groups on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border, including the First Nations community.
“We refuse to let Kinder Morgan turn our Salish Sea into a fossil fuel super-highway. Their operations are already unacceptably dangerous. The last thing we need is to make matters 700% worse. Such a massive increase in oil tanker traffic would not only jeopardize communities in BC, but in Washington as well. Kinder Morgan is a threat to us all,” said Zara Greene with the Mosquito Fleet.
