The national debate over oil development took an unusual turn on an Idaho highway early Tuesday morning when members of the NezPerce Tribe blocked the passage of a giant water evaporator headed for the oil sands of Alberta, Canada for two hours.
More than a hundred members of the NezPerce Tribe and environmental activists stretched across the highway at the border of the tribe's reservation. They attempted to stop a 255-foot long, two-lane-wide shipment they say is illegal.
Oregon-based shipper Omega Morgan decided to move the so-called “megaload” through a protected area of Idaho over objections from the U.S. Forest Service.
“I don't look at this as a symbolic issue,” said Silas Whitman, chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe. “Otherwise, we'd just issue a press statement, put up a few signs and just let it go. No, we've run out of time and initiatives. So that leaves us with disobedience, civil disobedience.”
Whitman was among more than a dozen people arrested overnight.
The megaload is scheduled to travel across Nez Perce ancestral land and a Wild and Scenic Corridor in the coming days.
The Nez Perce Tribe plans to ask for an injunction from a federal judge this week.
