Collateral Damage

"I would say this is probably so far the most direct and most immediate type threat to people's safety."

"When workers are sitting in vehicles and they are being attacked by these assailants swinging large axes, smashing the windows, hitting the vehicle when [workers'] bodies and heads are just feet away, having torches thrown at their vehicles and [in] the boxes  of their vehicles that could compromise their lives -- this has gone way too far."

RCMP Chief Superintendent Warren Brown

Damage caused to the Coastal GasLink construction site near Houston, B.C., on Feb. 17.-/AFP/Getty Images

"[We respect people's right to conduct peaceful protests], but intimidation of workers, impacts to the environment, and destruction of property and equipment goes far beyond protest and disagreement and is something we as British Columbians and Canadians can never condone."

LNG Canada

"Will the Trudeau government now seize the bank accounts of the foreign funded eco-terrorists responsible for this violence [referencing the Emergencies At permitting authorities to target donations made to illegal convoy activities]."

British Columbia Premier Jason Kenney

"If the Trudeau government is set on using the Emergencies Act to end blockades, then they should also use it to follow the money, seize the associated vehicles and provide all the resources necessary to ensure those illegally acting here [on the Coastal GasLink pipeline in northern British Columbia] are arrested for damaging and blocking this critical export infrastructure."

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe

The damage to the construction site was allegedly caused by 20 masked and camouflaged attackers.-/AFP/Getty Images

During his career overseeing the north district of the province of British Columbia RCMP Chief Superintendent Brown has long been accustomed to encountering the work of protesters, particularly those invested in protecting the environment as they see it, from exploitation by energy producers, but this latest episode of damaged industrial equipment, booby traps, incendiary devices and blockaded roadways represent an upscaled violence he had never before seen.

The violence took place on Thursday evening at a remote drilling site close to the Morice River. Security footage is being reviewed by investigators who are interviewing some nine Coastal GasLink employees present on the site when twenty or so masked marauders entered after midnight, brandishing axes, attacking security guards and threatening workers wih flare guns in a coordinated attack.

 

A surveillance camera captures an attacker lighting off a flare during the attack on the Coastal GasLink camp near Houston, B.C, on Feb. 17. This image, taken as the attack started, was provided by the company. The attackers disabled the cameras a short time later. Photo by Coastal GasLink /PNG

 

Heavy equipment and trailers suffered millions of dollars in damage. The attackers commandeered equipment at the site and used it to damage other machinery and to demolish site buildings. Equipment's hydraulic and fuel lines were cut by the attackers, as well, causing significant leaks. The Coastal GasLink pipeline, coming in at $6.7 billion, is owned by TC Energy Corp based in Calgary for the purpose of connecting British Columbia's shale gas resources to LNG Canada's export project in Kitimat, B.C.

The project, close to 60 percent complete for the 670-kilometre pipeline, has been stricken with demonstrations and blockades from environmentalists along with some First Nations groups, since the beginning of construction in 2019. The project has government approval, along with the support of all twenty elected First Nation councils spanning the pipeline's route through northern B.C. First Nations will see employment as a result, and will share in the pipeline's profits to an agreed-upon percentage.

It is some hereditary chiefs, not the democratically elected councils of the Wet'suwet'en people who are opposed to the project, a distinct minority. No arrests have yet been made relating to Thursday's attack; the challenge has not yet been met in identifying the assailants, disguised and masked when they arrived on foot at the site. 

The public and community must understand that the police response to the incident will not equate to a crackdown of law enforcement on lawful protest, said Chief Superintendent Brown. This was a violent, criminal act that will be treated with all the severity that the law commands. Canada's Western provincial premiers have called on the federal government for a more aggressive stance in responding to the attack, amidst heightened tensions across Canada in view of the blockade of truckers around Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

There are distinct differences in how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addresses these two very different situations. The Truckers' Convoy is viewed by the prime minister as a direct assault on his orders, which it is, as well as a defiance of a mandate that was totally unnecessary and which led to people losing their livelihoods, as well as threatening the deliveries of critical food and medical supplies across the country. Added to which the Convoy protesters made it abundantly clear that they abhor this prime minister and he, ostensibly governing all the people of Canada, returned their contempt in spades.

He has called for the first time in history on the Emergencies Act to solve a problem that policing agencies and local municipalities should have well in hand, but which will commandeer banks to freeze the bank accounts of all those identified as taking part in the protests, deemed unlawful under the special provisions he has brought to bear. A protest that has certainly got out of hand, and has done so because of the prime minister's inept and contemptible treatment of people's legitimate concerns.

 

Police rushing to assist Coastal GasLink workers who had been attacked by a group of about 20 people said their way was blocked by booby traps, including several fires. PNG

 

The violent incident in northern British Columbia, on the other hand, has elicited no comment from him, and nor has it featured large in most mainstream media, by contrast to the coverage given to the Truckers' Convoy and the clean-up aftermath of police making hundreds of arrests and towing away big rigs. Matters of environmentalists indulging in wildly vicious criminal behaviour is of relatively little interest to this government.

"Their arrival seemed to be very well coordinated. The violence, the rhetoric, the threats -- their purpose seemed to be very coordinated."

"This was definitely coordinated and it was targeted and it was done at that time for a specific reason."

"This is not about enforcing a court injunction. This is not about measuring the volatility of protesters."

"This is about a specific criminal act that happened on February 17."

"This is about 20 or so people who have taken it far too far and we're going to find out who they are."

RCMP Chief Superintendent Warren Brown

Millions of dollars in damaged equipment and property was left behind by vandals who attacked a Coastal GasLink site near Houston on Thursday. PNG