Emotional clean up underway at Standing Rock protest camp as it shuts down

Crews are working through the camp clearing abandoned areas and slowly moving things out from what was the largest protest camp in history where at one point, nearly 10,000 people had been living. The count is now down to 300. The Army Corps of Engineers has issued the permit to go head and extend the pipeline under the Missouri River.

Materials for salvage were set to the side, while loaders scraped up bucket loads of abandoned tents, sleeping bags, cooking utensils, food goods, and personal items mixed into slushy snow and ice. It all got poured into piles and dumpsters arranged around the camp perimeters and trucked to the landfill.

Hans Bradley, the brownfield coordinator for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, is overseeing this initial phase of the cleanup that will last through Friday, when the teams will regroup and assess.

“We’re trying to identify what should be cleaned up by asking people and getting their perspective on where we should start,” Bradley said.

He said the idea is to move carefully and thoughtfully through the camp, where some 300 are still living, cooking and going about their days.

He estimates that by the end of February, the area will be 95 percent cleared off. With that in mind, he said the tribe asked the the corps, which owns the land, and state agencies that offered help, to stand down while the tribe works its way through a difficult process.

Clean up with machines is emotional for some

It's an emotional time for the people who stood their ground at the camps. The area will most likely be commemorated for the history of the undertaking the protesters achieved.

“I don’t think the narrative is that this ended up in a trash dump. This was like a stone cast in the pond with a ripple effect all throughout the world. The reality is we inspired the world that together we could stand up to a powerful corporation,” Tilsen said.

He said the camp will eventually be commemorated and the unity and historic gathering of hundreds of tribal nations remembered in a prayerful ceremony.

I'm no supporter of these pipelines. They are dangerous and they burst or explode by the dozens on an annual basis. But, there are literally hundreds of them criss-crossing the country. There are already two pipelines going under that river in the same spot they want to build DAPL. There are several pipelines that cross right under the southern portion of my own Rez at Lac Courte Oreilles in northern Wisconsin, only a mile from my home. These old pipelines go all the way back to the 1950's and 60's.

Although this was a great fight and a great cause for the Standing Rock Sioux, and it was overwhelming to see all our Native Nations come together as they have to support them, it was a losing battle all along. Regardless of Trump or Clinton getting elected, they were both already in the pockets of Big Oil. Do some research and see Hillary's involvement with Big Oil. The oil and gas industry just has way too damn much money.

I say to my Native brothers and sisters and all protesters of these pipelines everywhere, If you really want to fight this, then we, all of us Americans, need to stop driving in cars, heating our homes with gas, traveling in planes, mowing your lawns with motorized mowers, or playing with our toys (4x4's and snowmobiles) and start going back to 150 year ago methods. Sorry to say, but the product that is destroying our planet is the product that we demand. Until we stop demanding it, we're all screwed!

a reply to: Rezlooper

My adopted sister and best friend is going back to Pine Tree in a couple of months. I am hoping to go this summer to help with a program she is working on. She spent some time at Standing Rock helping with the protest. It has been hard on a lot of the tribes. Some things never seem to change.

Trusting the government being a bad idea, is one of them.

Pick up all your trash and leave no trace.

#doubtful

I am not a supporter of these pipelines either. They could do them in a more safe and environmental friendly way with a lot less risk. But money seems to trump precautions. Think of this, with all the earthmovement and settling because of fracking and pulling water out of the ground, the pipelines may crack and a disaster happen. But I guess that rationality and our government is not even in the same book. I would curse these but to do so means I want a disaster to happen and that is not good either.

I support these people protesting this and their concerns, they are real concerns. I do not believe that we should be doing these pipelines in some places, especially when crossing water like that.

This kind of protesting I agree with, some of the other protests we are having lately are just hate protests, and their based on chaos, not rational thinking.

originally posted by: Rezlooper
Sorry to say, but the product that is destroying our planet is the product that we demand. Until we stop demanding it, we're all screwed!

The only product being demanded by these protesters was money and attention. The tribe played poker, bluffed, and lost... simple as that.

Want to protest even louder, and be heard much clearer? Let as little as possible of your money be spent on Big Oil. If more people really cared enough to do that!...

Your doing it wrong.

When your protests end up making a bigger environmental impact that what they are supposedly protesting about.

a reply to: Illumimasontruth

They don't and they won't.

a reply to: Rezlooper

I'm glad that the pipeline permit has been issued.

I hope that, in 20 years, I don't rescind that happiness.

originally posted by: Rezlooper

I say to my Native brothers and sisters and all protesters of these pipelines everywhere, If you really want to fight this, then we, all of us Americans, need to stop driving in cars, heating our homes with gas, traveling in planes, mowing your lawns with motorized mowers, or playing with our toys (4x4's and snowmobiles) and start going back to 150 year ago methods. Sorry to say, but the product that is destroying our planet is the product that we demand. Until we stop demanding it, we're all screwed!

Fossil fuel addiction. It's easy to get and hard to let go.

I have a quick question, as to the safety issue of the pipelines.

Wouldn't it be better to go over the river?
It just seems like any leak or break would be noticed faster.

Imagine your life without petroleum products...


Now stfu.

10,000 people in a makeshift town with no sewage or sanitation?

Sounds like devastating environmental impact.

Good riddance to illegal trespassers.

a reply to: Rezlooper

Here's the thing: It doesn't matter. We need oil, and we less foreign dependence on it. What would you rather have, thousands upon thousand more trucks spewing even more pollution? Getting in accidents and spilling oil while simultaneously injuring and killing people? So, yet again, here are some actual facts to counter yet another tired emotional argument.

What are "hundreds of pipelines? We have 2.5 million miles of them. In 2016 there were 297 incidents. that's one every 8,418 miles (also accounts for natural gas).
hip.phmsa.dot.gov...
Since you're phone can't be made with sunbeams, we still need oil... so let's consider the alternative delivery methods.
"oil pipelines are roughly 70 times as safe as trucks"
www.propublica.org...

a reply to: chiefsmom

They have sensors. It's more efficient than making someone stand at the river and wait for a leak to happen.

a reply to: Rezlooper

Here we have a large gathering of people concerned about keeping water clean and conservation who abandons and wastes. So much being thrown in the garbage. A landfill. Mother Earth will absorb all the pollution they left behind just as she always does.

It's a problem when thousands or more people live together in a group, they consume, destroy, waste and pollute. Doesn't matter how "green" you're going to go. The solution to really going "green" is to go back to small towns and spread them 30 or so miles apart. Then we can have our 4 x 4's if we want them. There is plenty of land on this planet for all of us. If the entire human population stood side by side with each other, they'd all fit into Texas. If the cities would just close down and move to another spot then Mother Earth could deal with the pollution left behind. Los Angeles and New York should have been built like a huge hen house on wheels. After 100 years, capable of picking up and moving without everyone having a hissy fit or going broke for it. Mother Earth's solution to this are earthquakes, in my opinion, trying to roll cities along but no one listens to her and they build in the same spot she said to get the flock out of. Think of all the jobs that would create. This is what we did back in the day. Back in the day, day. Nomadic.

My last thought before heading out is the tribes should celebrate the Army Corps of Engineers who could have easily blown them away with a flick of a finger, called in the CIA to create some kind of scandal to bring the leaders down but they were nothing but professional along with excelling above and beyond being just a good listener.

All the "we inspired everybody and stood up to a corporation and look at what we achieved!" talk is rather humorous given that they didn't really do anything they wanted to do, unless something changes in a big way.

But I mean....good on them for having a big ass campout and leaving a mess I guess?

originally posted by: bender151
a reply to: Rezlooper

Here's the thing: It doesn't matter. We need oil, and we less foreign dependence on it. What would you rather have, thousands upon thousand more trucks spewing even more pollution? Getting in accidents and spilling oil while simultaneously injuring and killing people? So, yet again, here are some actual facts to counter yet another tired emotional argument.

What are "hundreds of pipelines? We have 2.5 million miles of them. In 2016 there were 297 incidents. that's one every 8,418 miles (also accounts for natural gas).
hip.phmsa.dot.gov...
Since you're phone can't be made with sunbeams, we still need oil... so let's consider the alternative delivery methods.
"oil pipelines are roughly 70 times as safe as trucks"
www.propublica.org...

the usa is an oil exporter we produce more than we use, the foreign dependence argument does not hold water

KXL stuff is getting ready for shipment in South Bend. FINALLY but it's created a lot of good paying jobs for people while it just sat there waiting.

a reply to: bender151

Right, I get that. But it just seemed to me, that having it out in the open was better. Not to have someone watching non stop, but if someone just happen to walk by....

But, then I think of the opportunity for vandals.

Harder if it is buried.

Hmmm.