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US sued over plan to blast Utah canyon · GNN Daily Breaking News

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  Speaker 1: Environmental organizations filed a 50-page lawsuit in the United States
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  Speaker 1: District Court for the District of Utah challenging a federal
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  Speaker 1: approval that permits the blasting and paving of Gate Canyon,
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  Speaker 1: located roughly 100 miles southeast of Salt Lake City. The
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  Speaker 1: legal action targets a decision by the Bureau of Land
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  Speaker 1: Management approving a proposal by Duchesne County to transform an
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  Speaker 1: unpaved backcountry road into a paved industrial corridor designed to
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  Speaker 1: accommodate heavy oil tanker traffic. Plaintiffs, led by the Center
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  Speaker 1: for Biological Diversity and Regional Conservation Partners, allege that federal
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  Speaker 1: regulators improperly rushed the approval process and failed to conduct
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  Speaker 1: necessary environmental and cultural impact reviews before authorizing heavy construction
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  Speaker 1: in the historic canyon system. At the heart of the
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  Speaker 1: dispute is the potential destruction of historic inscriptions and rock
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  Speaker 1: art preserved along the canyon walls. During the late 19th century,
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  Speaker 1: Black soldiers serving in the 9th Cavalry, known historically as
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  Speaker 1: Buffalo Soldiers, carve their names into the sandstone formations while
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  Speaker 1: building the original wagon road through the canyon. The corridor
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  Speaker 1: also features signature inscriptions made with axle grease by 19th-century
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  Speaker 1: European freighters and pioneers, alongside ancient indigenous petroglyphs scattered throughout
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  Speaker 1: the broader Nine Mile Canyon region. Plaintiffs contend that planned
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  Speaker 1: rock blasting, road widening, and the resulting surge in heavy
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  Speaker 1: truck traffic will cause irreversible structural damage to these historical
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  Speaker 1: artifacts and erode the cultural heritage embedded along the rock face.
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  Speaker 1: The legal filing asserts that federal officials violated several federal statutes,
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  Speaker 1: including the National Environmental Policy Act, the National Historic Preservation Act,
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  Speaker 1: and the Endangered Species Act. Conservationists argue that the agency
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  Speaker 1: failed to evaluate how industrial transportation noise, air pollution, and
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  Speaker 1: physical vibration would impact the surrounding ecosystem, which provides critical
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  Speaker 1: habitat for wildlife such as the threatened Mexican spotted owl.
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  Speaker 1: The lawsuit forms part of a broader series of legal
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  Speaker 1: challenges against federal energy initiatives aiming to expand domestic resource
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  Speaker 1: extraction and streamline industrial infrastructure permitting on public lands.