UPDATE: Pipeline Foes Block Construction Site in Cortlandt with Tripod

UPDATE: Spectra Energy responds:

Algonquin Gas Transmission respects the right of individuals to peacefully protest and express their positions. We continue to implore peaceful protestors not to place themselves in an unsafe situation.

We do not condone actions that directly interfere with Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) authorized activities for the Algonquin Incremental Market (AIM) Project. Further, we do not condone actions that take critical public safety first responders away from their duties, thus placing citizens dependent on their assistance at risk.

Our pipelines provide a major source of energy for the nation, and it is our obligation to safely and securely operate these facilities. We can neither tolerate nor allow unauthorized individuals to enter company property – that is trespassing. Trespassing is not acceptable, and we will prosecute.

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Peekskill, NY—Six people were arrested Monday morning when foes of the Spectra pipeline projects in New York staged another protest.

Organizers said:

As part of an escalating peaceful resistance campaign, concerned New Yorkers engineered a dramatic and elaborate protest against pipeline construction early this morning. A team erected a 20-foot-tripod in the path of construction equipment, and then a woman who grew up in Croton climbed up and sat at the top, thereby effectively halting construction. Additionally, two people locked to the base of the tripod. A total of six people have been arrested and taken to the Peekskill Police Station.

Jessica Rechtschaffer, the climber, was born and raised in Croton, organizers said.

“I remember how the sirens from Indian Point would go off when I was a kid,” she said in the press release from ResistAIM, “and now Spectra Energy wants to build a major gas pipeline right next to the nuclear power plant even though they are a company with a terrible safety record. We can’t let that happen. If there’s an explosion next to the nuclear plant, there is no plan B.”

This action comes after years of residents and grassroots groups actively engaging in the regulatory process, only to be ignored by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), organizers said.

The City of Boston and more than 20 grassroots groups have filed a lawsuit in Federal Court challenging FERC's approval of the project.

FERC and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have said repeatedly that neither the current pipeline nor the new one pose a threat to the Indian Point Nuclear Plant.

RELATED:

• FERC Answers Cuomo's Request to Halt Pipeline Expansion
• NRC: Indian Point Safe to Restart