RIP Judy Bonds

Environmental justice activist Judy Bonds has passed away at the age of 58.

The WaPo has an excellent obit:
"A coalfields native who scraped by working in restaurants and convenience stores, Ms. Bonds was equivocal about the risks of mining until the 1990s, when the A.T. Massey Coal Co. arrived in Marfork hollow, one of the narrow, green valleys that wind through the Appalachian Mountains in southern West Virginia."

"Massey had planned a dam farther up Marfork hollow - an impoundment that would hold millions of gallons of coal sludge. Her family would be in danger if the dam failed, and such dams had failed before - including in 1972 at Buffalo Creek, W.Va., where 125 people were killed in the toxic flood."

"When she heard her grandson concocting escape plans in the event of a dam break, Ms. Bonds - the last holdout in Marfork - knew that it was time to move and time to call attention to the threats of mountaintop mining to clean air, clean water and the Appalachian way of life."

"'If coal is so good for us hillbillies,' she said at a 2008 Appalachian Studies Association conference, 'then why are we so poor?'"

My condolences to all who knew Judy, including her compatriots at Coal River Mountain Watch.

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