July 6, 2021
Breaking at the Willow River: On Tuesday, July 6, Enbridge drilling construction operations hit an aquifer. The video below shows them drilling mud. The yellow booms are to stop it from flowing downstream. It is called a frack out.
This action at the Willow River, a part of the Mississippi watershed, where the Canadian corporation Enbridge is attempting to drill under the waterbody using a technique known as horizontal directional drilling (HDD). The method carries the risk of discharging drilling mud and chemicals into the river, known as a “frac out.” – the risk became reality.
Shanai explains here: “We’re here on the Willow River. We’ve been over here in the river channel since 7 o’clock this morning holding space. One of the things we noticed when we got down here today, this area right here in the water, it appears to be something from the drilling of the Willow. This is what it looks and feels like, the drilling mud like clay. And you can see and feel it in the water. It’s much harder. It’s really warm and it’s coming up from the river bottom.
“So the Line 3 oil pipeline is currently in the process of drilling into this river and they hit an aquifer. This is now coming down the river channel. And you see, they put some kind of boom in the water to try to hold that in place. So this is the kind of thing that there’s nobody’s here to watch the water, to protect the water. This is what Enbridge does. This may not even be reported. We wouldn’t have known about this if we hadn’t been here. You can just see that even in the process of drilling the Line, they’ve got accidents and it’s impacting the water.
“So you can imagine why so many of us are standing up to say that this tar sands pipeline should not be finished. It should never have been permitted. And we’re here to protect the water and to pray for the water.”
@POTUS needs to #StopLine3 Require the Army Corps to engage in Federal EIS. #Palisades #mississippiriver willowriver #waterislife #1855treaty
Video by Keri Pickett
Wisconsin Citizens Media Cooperative 
This is unacceptable! We need to honor climate justice and our treaties.
Take samples, label them, and preserve a chain-of-custody so they can be analyzed.