A Ticking Time Bomb: How the Enbridge's Line 5 Pipeline Disaster Would Happen

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https://gandernewsroom.com/2021/03/19/time-bomb-line-5-disaster/


Just six miles from Mackinac Island is an environmental disaster waiting to happen.

MACKINAC ISLAND, Mich.—Just six miles west of Michigan’s most famous resort island, the Straits of Mackinac harbor deep underwater one of the state’s most dangerous ecological time bombs: Enbridge’s Line 5 oil pipeline.

Canadian oil giant Enbridge isn’t an especially safe or responsible company. Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has pointed to Enbridge’s long history of institutional recklessness and their responsibility for what was, at the time, the worst inland oil spill in American history—the devastation of the Kalamazoo River in 2010

The continued presence of the dual pipelines [Line 5] in the Straits of Mackinac violates the public trust and poses a grave threat to Michigan’s environment and economy,” DNR Director Dan Eichinger told The ’Gander. “Enbridge cannot unilaterally decide when laws and binding agreements apply and when they do not.”

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has called Enbridge’s record of safety violations “persistent and incurable.” Despite all this, Line 5 remains in operation as Enbridge has refused shutdown orders and sued the state to keep the oil flowing through the Straits of Mackinac.