According to the Huffington Post:
“About 150 miles from where thousands have protested for months that the Dakota Access pipeline could threaten a Sioux tribe’s water supply, a pipeline in the western part of North Dakota has spilled more than 130,000 gallons of oil into a creek, state officials said.
It’s unclear what caused the break, according to Wendy Owen, a spokeswoman for Wyoming-based True Companies, which owns the pipeline. A landowner discovered the leak Dec. 5. The company uses monitoring technology designed to detect leaks, but it possibly failed because of “the intermittent nature of the flow” of oil through the pipeline, Owen said.(1)
The spill, which went undetected by the pipeline owners until a local stumbled on it, has spread almost 7 km (5.4 miles) from the site of the leak, and at this stage, it’s not clear what caused the pipe to rupture, or how long it’s been leaking.
According to CNN, an estimated 4,200 barrels of crude oil leaked from the Belle Fourche Pipeline in Billings County, 150 miles (241 km) from Cannon Ball in North Dakota, where protesters have been fighting the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline.
For months, opponents of the Dakota Access Pipeline have been expressing fears that it would affect local drinking water, because it was to be built under the Missouri River near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation – the primary water source of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe.
Last week, the US Department of the Army announced that it would not approve the crossing of the pipeline under the Missouri River.
The massive nearby spill – which was discovered on the same day that the Dakota Access Pipeline construction permit was denied – might have just proved the protesters’ point… click here to read more
