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Oil Spill In The Yellowstone River

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The oil spill in the Yellowstone River and the debate over land use in the American West.

Clean up crews work to collect oil from along side the Yellowstone River in Laurel, Montana, Monday July 4, 2011. (AP)
Clean up crews work to collect oil from along side the Yellowstone River in Laurel, Montana, Monday July 4, 2011. (AP)

When it comes to nature and America, you don’t get bigger names than Yellowstone.

Friday night, near Billings, Montana, an Exxon-Mobil oil pipeline under the Yellowstone River burst, near midnight. For nearly an hour, the big pipe poured oil directly into the Yellowstone.

The river is raging right now. At high flood stage.

It has spread that oil far and wide. Now, clean-up crews are all over. The damage is being assessed.

And once again, Americans are facing the full price of oil and energy, as extraction booms in the West.

This hour On Point: we’re going to the Yellowstone.
-Tom Ashbrook
Guests:

Rob Rogers, reporter, Billings-Gazette. Check out their excellent coverage of the oil spill.

Alexis Bonogofsky, owner of Blue Creek Farms, ten miles from the pipe rupture site. See a slideshow of her oil-covered land.

Brian Schweitzer, governor of Montana.

Jim Jensen, executive director, Montana Environmental Information Center.

Philip Verleger, founder of PkVerleger.

The site of the spill, according to the Billings Gazette.
[googlemap title="Approximate location of the oil spill" url="http://maps.google.com/maps?q=U.S.+212+bridge+in+Laurel,+mt&hl=en&ll=45.643568,-108.758812&spn=0.060486,0.154324&sll=45.759892,-108.546816&sspn=0.03018,0.077162&gl=us&z=13" width="630" height="350"]

This program aired on July 6, 2011.

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