Attackers allegedly swung axes, ignited flare at a company vehicle
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has released three videos showing what transpired at the natural gas pipeline work camp near Houston in British Columbia on Thursday last week.
Mounties published three video clips Tuesday in connection with the "acts of violence and damage done" at the work camp near Houston. The videos show a group of people, some of whom are "armed with axes", approaching the Coastal GasLink camp on Thursday, according to a report from CTV News, citing RCMP.
The videos show that a group stormed the property and attacked a company vehicle with an employee onboard, they said.
"The unknown individuals, who were similarly dressed, swung axes at the vehicle; spray painted the window and ignited what is suspected to be a flare gun," the RCMP wrote in a press release.
The individuals allegedly used grinders to cut the locks off a gate, then proceeded to cause an estimated $6 million in damage to equipment and structures at the pipeline worksite, according to a Global News report.
Coastal GasLink called the violence concerning, saying that there was an attempt by some of the attackers to set a vehicle on fire while workers were inside, according to a report from National Post.
Nine Coastal GasLink employees were attacked but none were physically harmed, the company said, according to the CTV News report.
Last week, police said that about 20 people were involved in the said attack.
Officers responding to the scene found the forest service road blocked with "downed trees, tar-covered stumps, wire, boards with spikes in them and fires," as well as an old school bus, according to CTV News.
Also, "several people" threw smoke bombs and "fire-lit sticks" at officers as they made their way through the debris, leaving one injured, according to the report, citing the police.
At the camp, police found significant damage to heavy machinery, fencing and buildings, but no one was at the site.
No one has claimed responsibility for the incident.
"While we respect everyone's right to peacefully protest in Canada, we cannot tolerate this type of extreme violence and intimidation," Chief Supt. Warren Brown, north district commander for the B.C. RCMP, said in a news release last week.
Blockade spot
The incident took place early Thursday morning on the Marten Forest Service Road. Coastal GasLink’s Morice River Forrest Service Road drilling site is 60 kms southwest of Houston. The company is constructing a 670 km natural gas pipeline running through the area.
On Monday, RCMP in northern B.C. said officers are investigating the alleged attack as a criminal act and not a breach of an injunction, according to Global News.
Coastal GasLink said the confrontation occurred in the same spot where a blockade protesting the pipeline’s construction was set up last year for about two months, according to the National Post.
In November 2021, 500 Coastal GasLink workers were rescued after being stuck behind a blockade near Houston, B.C. for four days following a protest by the Gidimt’en Clan of the Wet'suwet'en Nation. A month later, RCMP said that they are investigating allegations that protesters threatened security officials at a pipeline in northern B.C.
Back then, the Clan had set up three blockades along the only access road to the two work camps to protest the construction of the natural gas pipeline and plans to drill under the Wedzin Kwa (Morice River).
Wet’suwet’en First Nation councillors issued a statement saying that the protest group does not represent its members: “We want to make it absolutely clear that the actions of a few members of the Gidimt’en Clan who claimed to evict Coastal GasLink and the RCMP from the headwaters of the Morice River (Wedzin Kwa in our language) do not represent the collective views of the clan or of most Wet’suwet’en people.”
The statement was signed by elected chief Maureen Luggi, councillor Karen Ogen and councillor Heather Nooski.
