From Uwchlan Safety Coalition via Facebook:
The #emergency order from the PUC has been granted! #MarinerEast 1 will be shut down!!!!!
Public hearing will be March 15th!
#Uwchlan must be heard here! Please, while many of you have already #emailed your supervisors today, please, do it again!
Ask for them to file their own complaint with PUC!
Consider this! Uwchlan Township is next door to the area where #Sunoco did not do their homework on the geology and put public safety and property at risk! Our water supply and our unique land formations including a fault line exists along the pipeline route in Uwchlan! Let’s make sure Sunoco has done their job correctly here!
Email our township supervisors asking for the complaint to be filed at PUC!
WMiller@uwchlan.com
MBaumann@uwchlan.com
KDoan@uwchlan.com
http://www.puc.state.pa.us/pcdocs/1556680.pdf
#noME2 #stopETP #shutitdown
What is in the media (there is more as this story is spreading like wildfire, I just posted a couple of sources):
Delco Times Heron’s Nest by Phil Heron Thursday March 8:
PUC pulls plug on Mariner East 1 – for now
Karst….I’m pretty sure Sunoco Pipeline is already tired of hearing it.
Karst refers to a geologic formation where the ground is situated on old limestone formations that have been weakened by moisture over decades.
It turns out it’s a pretty common occurrence in this area – particularly across a swath of Chester County.
Exactly in many of the same spots where Sunoco Pipeline is now running gases through its Mariner East 1 pipeline and is constructing Mariner East 2….These weakened karst areas are susceptible to sinkholes, fissures and other ground settling, in particular when the ground is disturbed, such as when drilling trenches for a new pipeline.
and… Philadelphia Inquirer…
PUC orders Sunoco pipeline shutdown after sinkholes expose bare pipe near Exton
Updated: MARCH 7, 2018 — 5:36 PM EST
by Andrew Maykuth, Staff Writer amaykuth@phillynews.com
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission on Wednesday ordered the immediate shutdown of Sunoco Pipeline’s Mariner East 1 system after sinkholes exposed the bare pipeline in Chester County, which PUC investigators said “could have catastrophic results” if not repaired.
Gladys M. Brown, the PUC’s chair, granted an emergency order to halt operations on the 8-inch-diameter pipeline, which went into service in 1931 originally to carry motor fuel. It now carries up to 70,000 barrels a day of high-pressure volatile natural gas liquids such as propane from the Marcellus Shale gas region to a Sunoco terminal in Marcus Hook
Craziness.
How is it life had to reach a crisis point like this?
Apparently where the pipeline is causing sinkholes over in West Whiteland is also close to train tracks? Active train tracks? As in AMTRAK tracks? I am guessing the railroad will not be too happy about this when they check it out or we can hope, right?
There is so much that could go wrong and so much that already has it gone wrong, right?
And all they are doing is back filling sinkholes with concrete, correct? Considering we are talking Karst formations (and geology is not my forte and I have heard other terminology used as well with Chester County and the sinkholes which can occur) are they just going to turn Chester County into one giant concrete pad and that is their solution?
Is Sunoco/Sunoco Logistics/Energy Transfer Partners L.P. that greedy that they would put our homes, health,safety, and welfare at risk like this? (Yes, I realize that is a somewhat redundant question, but it has to be asked yet again, doesn’t it?)
Supervisors, commissioners, and borough officials throughout Chester County really should be paying attention to this. And a lot of them aren’t. And if you live in a Township affected by pipelines you should be pressuring your elected officials to contact the PUC immediately!
And this is also why people shouldn’t just roll over with regard to the Adelphia Gateway pipeline poised to become Mariner East- Lite.
Go ahead, plug your address into that interactive pipeline map Chester County Planning Commission has on their pipeline information page. You will see what I saw that there are a lot of pipelines crisscrossing Chester County and neighboring counties. I was told (and I have no reason to disbelieve the person who told me) that a lot of these pipeline companies are waiting to see what happens with Sunoco, so doesn’t that say to you if we don’t stop this now as an extended dual county and extended county community, we will just keep fighting the same thing over and over again?
Our homes are our castles. They want to take part of our land via eminent domain as fake utility companies and we’re supposed to be OK with that and all the havoc pipelines are causing?
Bull Twaddle.
I don’t know about you, but I’m not OK with it. I’m not OK living in a blast zone, that’s just as bad as having the pipeline go down my street as far as I’m concerned.
Perhaps the most galling thing of all is still the fact that we don’t benefit for what they are raping our land for and destroying our property values for, are we?
What is being plundered from the very ground below us, doesn’t benefit us. It gets shipped overseas, doesn’t it?
Please note the photos used in this post are courtesy of Eric Friedman/Middletown Coalition for Community Safety. If I have not attributed properly– community groups, please let me know.
#DefendWhatYouLove – there is no other option. We live here. It’s where we call home. We cannot as a collective extended community just silently fall victim to these corporations.