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Down with King Coal! Save Appalachia - Stop Mountain Range Removal!

Take Action on February 10th!

There is an institution near you complicit in mountain range removal coal mining. A coal company, an electric utility, a government office, a bank, a lobbying firm.

This is a call for a simultaneous day of action against mountain range removal across Appalachia, the US and the world. Be as loud as you can in protest of watershed destruction!

Protest! Demonstrate! Make some phone calls! Send some email!
Turn off the lights! Take direct action!

Our demand is simple – stop mountain range removal and all forms of destructive strip mining for coal.

The Appalachian Mountains are among the oldest mountains in the world. They contain the most biologically diverse temperate forest and freshwater aquatic ecosystems on the planet. Two hundred million years of wind, water, and ice have eroded the Appalachian mountains to about half of their original height. Massey Energy Co., Arch Coal, National Coal and other corporations have decided that that was much too long and are trying to get the other half in only a few decades. Greedy multinational corporations, with support from corrupt government agencies, are perpetuating the greatest ecological crime in history: the destruction of water producing mountain ranges.

Groups and individuals across Appalachia are rising in united protest against the increasing cultural and environmental devastation caused by this most destructive form of mining. Mountain range removal results in loss of life, loss of employment, destruction of homes, and elimination of communities throughout the coalfields.

In West Virginia alone, three million pounds of explosives are detonated every day, over 600 square miles of mountains have been reduced to barren wasteland, and more than 40,000 mining jobs have been eliminated. Valley fills have buried over 1,200 miles of Appalachian streams forever. Billions of gallons of chemical-laden sludge, restrained only by leaky, failure-prone earthen dams, loom above our communities and schools. Mountain range removal has expanded beyond West Virginia and Kentucky and is a growing problem in Virginia and Tennessee. Meanwhile, dirty politicians grant the coal industry its every desire. Such a condition can no longer be endured and will no longer be tolerated. It used to be called mountain top removal but so many mountains have been destroyed that it is now referred to as mountain RANGE removal. It is a war against the earth.

Click on image for a larger version

(Mountain Range Removal in West Virginia, near Kayford Mountain. Photo by V. Stockman. www.ohvec.org, flight by Southwings.com)

Massey Coal Corporation is an evil mountain leveling corporation and we need your help confronting this company and King Coal in general. Massey busts unions, destroys mountains and buys politicians. They are wrecking southern West Virginia and eastern Kentucky. They are owned by the billion dollar Fleur Corporation. Massey deserves your attention on February 10th.

Here’s what you can do:

If you’re good at picketing-picket. If you’re good at guerilla theatre, do it. If you can chalk, call, email or take direct action - whatever you do best – do it. Call your representatives (ick!), go to a nearby area doing an action, see who is evil in your town, protest in front of your federal building, issue press releases, protest your utility company and demand they not buy coal from companies involved with mountain range removal, protest your university if they are using coal, picket Peabody, Massey, National Coal, and lots more. Contact us if you’re in a major city and need some suggested locations - there are plenty. See the contact list below for websites, addresses and other info. You can use the companies’ websites to find out who they are, where their directors are from, where their offices and mines are, etc… A google search on many of these companies will also turn up who their investors are. This is a call for non-violent action.

Do whatever you do best, but do it on Feb 10th. Our theme is “as Massey as you wanna be” to express solidarity with our friends in West Virginia. Don’t be limited though, there are many different tentacles to the mountain devouring corporate robber barons, so pick your target and give ‘em some grief.

For the Mountains!

Appalachian Mountain Preservation Council
Ministry of Propaganda

Please let us know about your action. If you need more info, please email:
annebonnylives (at) yahoo.com
johnjef (at) bledsoe.net
bamsterman (at) charter.net
edge37343 (at) yahoo.com

Good websites with lots of mountain top removal info: www.ohvec.org, www.appvoices.org

Coal Contacts:

Feel free to contact the following and express your disapproval of mountain range removal and all other forms of destructive surface mining.

Massey Energy (destroyer of mountains, waterways and communities in WV and KY, also viciously anti-union)
Massey Energy Company - 4 North 4th Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219
Phone: 888-424-2417, 804-788-1824 http://www.masseyenergyco.com
Massey.Hotline (at) masseyenergyco.com
Some of Massey’s top managers: katherine.kenny (at) masseyenergyco.com, john.parker (at) masseyenergyco.com, michael.allen (at) masseyenergyco.com,
steve.sears (at) masseyenergyco.com, gary.smith (at) masseyenergyco.com,
gary.temple (at) masseyenergyco.com, tom.kielty (at) masseyenergyco.com,
thomas.dougherty (at) masseyenergyco.com

A&G Coal Corporation (This is the VA company that killed a little boy last fall with a runaway boulder) Phone (276) 328-3421

National Coal Corporation (leading the charge for destruction in TN)
National Coal - 8915 George Williams Rd. Knoxville, TN 37923
Phones: 865-769-3749, 865-690-6900, 866-703-COAL (toll Free) Fax: 865-691-9982
Email: info (at) nationalcoal.com, investorrelations (at) nationalcoal.com, sales (at) nationalcoal.com, jdavis (at) nationalcoal.com

Crestview Capital Funds (an institutional investor in NCC)
95 Revere Drive, Suite A, Northbrook, Illinois, 60062 Phone: 847-559-0060 Fax: 847-559-5807
http://www.crestviewcap.com Email: lisa (at) crestviewcap.com

Cunningham & Company (a public relations firm working for NCC)
730 W. Randolph St., 6th Floor Chicago, Illinois, 60661 Phone: 312-876-1070 Fax: 312-454-0261
http://www.cunninghamcomp.com, Email: info (at) cunninghamcomp.com

West Virginia Coal Association (lobbying group) P.O. Box 3923, Charleston, WV 25339
http://www.wvcoal.com Phone: 304-342-4153 Fax: 304-342-7651
Staff of the WV Coal Ass:
President - Bill Raney - braney (at) wvcoal.com, Senior VP - Chris Hamilton - chamilton (at) wvcoal.com
VP - Dan Miller - dmiller (at) wvcoal.com, Regulatory Affairs - Jason Bostic - jbostic (at) wvcoal.com
Administrative Assistant - Sandi Davison - sdavison (at) wvcoal.com

Friends of Coal (another industry front group)
P.O. Box 3923 Charleston, WV 25339 1-866-982-2625 http://www.friendsofcoal.org

Just in case you hadn’t already heard – folks are organizing for Mountain Justice Summer 2005. This will be a coordinated effort to bring attention to the destruction caused by mountain range removal and to confront the corporate and government entities involved.

Please visit www.mountainjusticesummer.org for more info.

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The Green Party of Monroe County will be hosting a talk on affordable renewable energy sources for the home and business on Monday, February 14th at 7pm at 179 Atlantic Avenue. Presenting will be Shawn Lessord of Quality Solar Concepts.

There is a not only a dreadful ecological toll to Mountain Range Removal--but it has a human face as well. This is a call to action. The picture is of Jeremy Davidson, 3, was killed when a boulder was dislodged by a bulldozer and came crashing through his bedroom from a Mountain Top Removal site. He was crushed in his sleep. The picture was taken by Michael Williamson.

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