Salmon Spawning

With latest Environmental Assessment Office warnings, Coastal GasLink drilling endangers critical salmon spawning in Wedzin Kwa

Despite all the environmental certificate violations, Coastal GasLink continues to work and is now drilling under Wedzin Kwa during this very critical time of salmon spawning. As far as we can see, there is no mitigation happening (such as fences to help stop salmon from spawning in those areas).

Coastal GasLink is even blasting since drilling is difficult in this location. As Matt Simmons writes in The Narwhal, “Coastal GasLink is putting its pipeline under the river at the riskiest time for salmon.”

If you walk into any Department of Fisheries and Oceans office and ask “is it illegal to disturb any channel during active salmon spawning?” the answer will be a resounding YES. Yet CGL continues to drill, and the vibrations and noise can be felt and heard kilometers away from the site – including on the other side of the river. 

As reported in The Vancouver Sun, “The EAO has issued dozens of warnings, 16 orders and two fines against Coastal GasLink and its contractors since work started on the project with many of the violations related to allowing erosion or sediment into sensitive waterways.”

Sockeye Salmon numbers have been in steep decline in recent years. However, thanks to Wet’suwet’en actively working to protect salmon and Wedzin Kwa, these numbers have increased. We have a responsibility to the salmon, yet CGL risks undoing our hard work to protect our more-than-human relatives.

CGL security with the RCMP have restricted access completely, including to our cultural sites, threatening anyone trying to access Woos’ smokehouse with arrest and have even attempted to block Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs from accessing our territory.