Grandmother arrested after blocking pipeline construction in Ford Pinto

A 64-year-old woman was arrested earlier this week after she reportedly blockaded herself into a 1971 Ford Pinto and prevented Mountain Valley Pipeline construction in West Virginia.

Becky Crabtree, charged with obstruction earlier this week, was later released on her own recognizance, according to a local NBC affiliate. 

Crabtree, who is a grandmother and retired schoolteacher, reportedly blockaded herself in the Pinto at the worksite of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, which spans approximately 303 miles from northwestern West Virginia to southern Virginia.

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“It just hit me,” Crabtree told Vice News on Friday. “I can’t just teach my students about climate change and have them fill out a sentence about fossil fuel energy and its negative impact. I know what the impacts are. I have to live this.”

Crabtree said she’s trying to “slow up the process” for the construction of the pipeline, because “once the pipeline is in the ground, the judge can say, ‘It is too late now.’ Sometimes the courts need time to catch up.” 

Crabtree said she had written letters, organized debates, and attended town halls and protests to fight the construction of the pipeline prior to the demonstration.

“I’ve pretty much exhausted all my other options,” Crabtree said. “It wasn’t on bucket list to get arrested, but now can tell my grandkids that your grandmother was arrested trying to save this land.” Crabtree is currently awaiting her sentencing.

According to Vice News, Crabtree is the latest person to join the fight against the pipeline, with protests from local residents and environmental groups igniting across the region.

Once constructed, the pipeline would span more than 1,000 bodies of water and roughly 245 miles of forest, which protesters say could pose a threat to the area’s municipal water supplies and habitat, according to the publication.

Last week, a federal court rescinded permits for the project to cross the Jefferson National Forest, saying that the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management had not properly reviewed the pipeline’s environmental impact, according to The Washington Post.

The construction is scheduled to pass through 3.6 miles of the forest, according to the Post.

The agencies were ordered to reconsider the permits.