An ExxonMobil pipeline spewed tens of thousands of barrels of oil last week, covering an American town with tar sands crude. Now it's refusing to share information that could protect the people affected.
Tell ExxonMobil to release all the information about the spill.
This past weekend, an ExxonMobil pipeline carrying nearly 100,000 barrels of toxic tar sands crude spewed into the American town of Mayflower, Arkansas. Yards are flooded in black crude, a river of toxic oil flows down the street, and the nearby fishing lake is covered in black grease. Families have been evacuated, but nobody knows what the dangers to the community are, or even how much oil has been spilled. Why? Because Exxon’s not talking.
Let’s hold ExxonMobil accountable by demanding it release all the information on this spill -- the good, the bad, and the ugly -- while the images of playsets and driveways overrun with crude oil are still in the public eye.
Tell ExxonMobil to release information about the crude spilled in Arkansas.
ExxonMobil is the largest consumer-facing oil company in the world, operating under the name Esso, Mobil, and Exxon in dozens of countries. It's is being so secretive because it wants people to believe that pipelines like this are perfectly safe and pose no threat to people or the planet. But this catastrophe in Arkansas foreshadows a future reality for anyone who lives along the thousands of miles of pipeline being considered for approval by governments across the globe.
ExxonMobil's pipeline division carries millions of barrels of dirty crude across thousands of miles of pipelines -- and it is heavily lobbying governments to ensure it can continue to build these pipelines wherever it wants. Right now, ExxonMobil and other oil companies are lobbying furiously for the Keystone XL, a massive pipeline stretching across the North America that will transport enough toxic tar to be "game over" for the planet. It's also actively supporting the proposed Trans-Caspian pipeline in Europe and proposed pipelines in Australia and Asia.
The last thing ExxonMobil and its ilk want is to tell us the truth about its dirty business while legislators are making such a high-stakes decision on the Keystone XL and other dangerous pipelines. It knows that if we can use this spill in Arkansas to show the world the reality of these pipelines, we may be able to stop these dangerous pipelines in their tracks. And it's especially vulnerable to public pressure right now, since images of backyards covered in its tar sands crude are leaking out and going viral on Facebook.
Tell ExxonMobil to release all the information it has on the massive pipeline spill.
Together, we can expose the reality for people in the path of the crude spill, help show the public that the pipelines that ExxonMobil and other major companies haven't started construction on yet are unsafe too, and hopefully stop future pipelines in their tracks entirely.
Thanks for all you do,
Angus, Marguerite, and the team at SumOfUs.org
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More Information:
Exxon Mobil pipeline leaks ‘a few thousand’ barrels of crude oil in Arkansas. Washington Post. March 31st, 2013
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