Mark Hamilton, the Executive Vice President of Public Affairs at the Pebble Partnership, went full Loose Unit tonight at a meeting of the Russian Jack Community Council. The meeting took place in the library of Wonder Park Elementary School. Pebble has been doing the community council circuit lately.
When asked a question about the Mount Polley mine disaster, Hamilton said the disaster was due to a failure of Canadian regulators. Another person added that kind of disaster would never happen in Alaska because we have better regulators, Hamilton agreed. Hamilton went on to say, “It is such a key point. Look at this, you can – just because this is the day – you could design a perfectly functional, perfectly safe commercial aircraft. What you can’t do is stop some idiot from flying it into the Twin Towers.” Hamilton was basically saying that you can have good technology but there can be failures due to human error. While true, I’m not sure it gets any more tone deaf than this. Especially from someone whose job is public affairs.
Here is audio of the conversation:
Keep in mind, Hamilton is a retired Army Major General and the past president of the University of Alaska. Now he is promoting Pebble Mine at community council meetings in elementary school libraries. I bet he is getting paid a lot!
I lost a lot of respect for Hamilton when I found out he is working for Pebble. Sad to see.
I invite Pebble to have such a meeting in Bristol Bay..
We humans do not have a good track record regarding respect for our precious earths resources. So stand firm and hope the money paradigm does not succeed here.
I am beginning to understand how the University got into fiscal trouble. He apparently used this same technique of summarily dismissing valid concerns to justify his actions there. If only the fiscal “regulators”( Legislature) had done their job the ‘”fiscal Dam” he created within the University System may not have burst as it has.
The Mount Polly Mine disaster was caused by greed. The desire to save money in order to pocket more. The previous engineering company dropped the contract, warning that the tailings pond was holding too much water. Then “….Gerald MacBurney, a former foreman who worked on the tailings pond, says he had warned of a disaster in the making for two years. He said management kept building the dam higher but ignored his requests to shore up the dam with enough rock to make it safe….” The fact that Mark Hamilton is trying to pawn the responsibility off on someone else… Read more »
Pebble is enabling the mining nutcases to put a giant earthern dam to hold back toxic wastes at the headwaters of one of the last great ecosystems left on Earth. I think Hamilton is the nutcase he is talking about. Only nutcases would promote this mine in Bristol Bay.
how much did nrdc lawyers pay you for this?
Nothing is worse than anti-pebble rhetoric coming from retired past oil field workers. Yuk.
Except the contents of those tailings when they enter the streams.
And murderers.
Bigotry.
Unchecked greed.
Cancer.
Certain venereal diseases.
Anti-pebble rhetoric. Too funny.