Mountain Removal

I love the mountains, and I believe that I can say the same about everyone else in this room. As a lover of the mountains of the Appalachian I believe that it is my duty to notify all of you of the situation in the southern Appalachians. In the southern, West Virginian section of the Appalachians, mountains are being destroyed through the act of mountaintop removals, where the top of the mountains are being taken off for the coal hidden underneath the first hundred or so feet of rock and soil. I would know what this destruction looks like because of all the experience I have had driving across this landscape, and because of all the hours of flying over and capturing pictures of the covertly decimated mountains. I believe that together we can break the deafening silence that surrounds this unspoken tragedy.

It is unimaginable to believe that up to 500 mountains have been destroyed from mountaintop removal spanning from northeast Tennessee and eastern Kentucky, through western Virginia and southwest West Virginia, all the way to Charleston, West Virginia.  In some counties it is calculated that up to 40% of the landscape has been destroyed from the mountains being flattened. These areas are among the richest, most diverse temperate forests in North America, and until mountaintop removal began 20 years ago, they were the source of clean water and beautiful tourist areas for much of the eastern U.S.  

Imagine a beautiful New Hampshire landscape, mountains like precious gems spread across the whole horizon. Now imagine that you look across the same horizon in the same location three to five years later and find yourself looking at a totally different landscape. Half of the mountains are cut in half and the others stand alone as foothills compared to what used to be. You have just witnessed what it is like to find yourself in the midst of a mountain-top removal area in West Virginia. Not only is this common, unsatisfying, and demeaning to see but it creates major environmental problems. The mountaintop removals in West Virginia are long overdue for opposition, and need to be rebelled against. Let us stand up together, and maybe we can make a difference before it is too late.