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Inside Elon Musk's plan to rain SpaceX's rocket debris over Hawaii's pristine waters
Inside Elon Musk's plan to rain SpaceX's rocket debris over Hawaii's pristine waters

The Guardian

time6 days ago

  • Science
  • The Guardian

Inside Elon Musk's plan to rain SpaceX's rocket debris over Hawaii's pristine waters

The north-west Hawaiian island of Mokumanamana is said to be touched by the gods. Bisected by the Tropic of Cancer latitude line, it is deep in the Pacific Ocean, about 400 miles from Honolulu. The island's steep rocky cliffs give way to indigo blue waters dotted with monk seals and stony coral. No humans have lived on Mokumanamana, but it has the world's highest density of ancient Hawaiian religious sites. 'It sits as a boundary between what Native Hawaiians refer to as 'pō', the darkness, and 'au', the light,' said William Aila, the former chair of Hawaii's department of land and natural resources. 'When a Hawaiian passes, their soul makes its way from wherever it is in the main Hawaiian Islands, up to the North-western Hawaiian Islands. And at that juncture, at pō, they're met by their ancestors.' As Aila tells it, if a person has been good, they can pass into pō and be with their ancestors, who inhabit the Pacific waters west of Mokumanamana. The hundreds of miles of ocean that surround Mokumanamana and other Hawaiian islands are now under threat, according to environmentalists and scientists. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the agency that oversees air and space travel in the US, announced in May that it had given Elon Musk permission to detonate rocket ships from his company SpaceX over these protected waters. SpaceX first brought its request, a proposal called the Starship Super Heavy Project, to the FAA in 2022. In 2023, the company was given a license to launch its massive Starship rocket five times a year. In 2024, Musk proposed quintupling that number to 25 a year. SpaceX's launch base is located in Boca Chica, Texas, surrounded by a state park and federal wildlife refuge. To date, 10 Starship rockets have attempted to take off from there, the majority of which have ended in scattershot explosions, blasting metal shrapnel and debris from the Gulf of Mexico to the Indian Ocean. In conjunction with the increased number of launches, Musk proposed expanding the area in the Pacific Ocean where debris from his exploded Starships can land by roughly 75 times its original scope. This new area encompasses vast regions throughout the Pacific, including around the eight main Hawaiian islands, Mokumanamana and the entire north-west Hawaiian chain of islands – which lie within the Papahānaumokuākea marine national monument, a Unesco world heritage site. The monument is considered one of the most ecologically unique and diverse areas in the world, with 7,000 species of birds, turtles, marine mammals, fish and coral, some of which are critically endangered. It is also the largest protected area on Earth, covering nearly 600,000 sq miles of water. Ancestors of modern Hawaiians explored the open ocean here, navigating by stars. During Joe Biden's final days in office, his administration designated the monument as a sanctuary, giving it enhanced legal protections. Once SpaceX ramps up launches, bird and sea life could face hazardous material spills, falling objects and sonic booms, according to thousands of pages of government documents reviewed by the Guardian and interviews with more than a dozen people, including oceanographers, aerospace engineers, former government employees, lawyers and Hawaiian residents. They fear Musk's 'fail fast' approach to rocket launches, along with his ties to the US government, could mean SpaceX will have free rein over the region. Many in Hawaii say the FAA's review of potential environmental consequences is not thorough enough. 'We, especially as Native Hawaiians who have a special relationship to that place, simply want an honest and true assessment of the risk before consenting to the raining of thousands of pieces of a failed rocket,' said Aila, who is also the former chair of Papahānaumokuākea's advisory council. Musk, the world's richest person, has framed his SpaceX expansion plan as existential, crucial to the survival of the human race. One day in the not-so-distant future, he says, the development of SpaceX's Starship rocket will culminate in his ultimate goal of colonizing the planet Mars. Starship is the largest and most powerful spaceship ever built, standing 40 stories tall when all its parts stack. It's designed to eventually be fully reusable and comes equipped with a Super Heavy booster and engines that burn methane gas and liquid oxygen. Musk originally codenamed it BFR (Big Fucking Rocket). 'Starship is the first design of a rocket that is actually capable of making life multiplanetary,' Musk said in a speech last year. 'We don't want to be one of those lame one-planet civilizations. We want to be a multiplanetary civilization, ultimately be a multi-stellar civilization, be out there among the stars.' For Musk, the cost of harming the delicate ocean ecosystem is outweighed by the benefits of space exploration. 'If the [Starship] did hit a whale, it's like, honestly, that whale had it coming, cause the odds are so low,' Musk said in October while campaigning for Donald Trump. 'It's like Final Destination: The Whale Edition. It's like fate had it in for that whale.' Musk, SpaceX and the White House did not return requests for comment. When a Starship detonates and plunges to the sea, there are three possible outcomes, according to the FAA. First, it could have a hard landing at 'terminal velocity', which would cause the rocket to break apart on impact creating an 'explosive event' on the water's surface. Second, it could have a 'soft water landing and tip over and sink'. Or lastly, the rocket could break up during atmosphere re-entry, causing debris to scatter across the ocean. In the run-up to the FAA's approval of SpaceX's 25 launches a year, federal agencies that work with endangered species issued biological opinions on the possible impact of these three scenarios. The National Marine Fisheries Service said dozens of species would be 'affected', including various species of whale, turtle, seal, fish, shark, coral and other ocean life. The agency specifically pointed to three types of sea turtle – green, Kemp's ridley and loggerhead – as being 'adversely affected'. Those adverse effects could come from things like sonic booms, falling debris and fuel and oil spills, according to the agency. In its biological opinion, the Fish and Wildlife Service retraced what went wrong during Starship's first seven test launches in Boca Chica, Texas. The first launch pulverized the launchpad and sent chunks of concrete flying several miles throughout the wildlife refuge. The second flight went without incident, but the third ignited two brush fires, and the fourth tossed metal sheeting into the surrounding state park and damaged eggs in nine birds' nests. The following three flights resulted in singed vegetation, a tornado-like 'gravel plume' and the carcasses of a black-necked stilt and brown pelican. Despite the federal agencies' foreboding assessments, they concluded the impact from twice-monthly Starship launches would probably be rare, and thus 'insignificant'. The Fish and Wildlife Service declined to provide further comment. A spokesperson for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), which heads the marine fisheries service, said it recommended conservation measures, like gathering acoustic data on explosions and monitoring falling debris. The FAA came to the same 'no significant impact' conclusion in its final 90-page environmental assessment of SpaceX's proposal. The agency acknowledged the potential threats but said they would be infrequent and the risk was low. As a result, the FAA approved a five-year license for 25 Starship launches a year and allowed for the vast zone in the Pacific to be a debris 'action area'. If rocket detritus falls outside the permitted zone, the FAA or other federal agencies may investigate, though the approval does not delineate specific penalties. The FAA assessment bears a major caveat, though: it was in effect prepared by SpaceX itself. SpaceX employees and consultants from the firm SWCA, hired by SpaceX, authored the 90-page document, according to its list of preparers. Four FAA employees were listed as 'independent evaluators'. A separate 106-page biological assessment the FAA used to evaluate Starship's impact on endangered species was also prepared by another company hired by SpaceX, the defense contractor ManTech SRS Technologies. An FAA spokesperson said applicants may prepare environmental assessments (EA) for the agency, and if they do, 'the FAA advises and assists the applicant during preparation of the EA and independently evaluates and takes responsibility for the EA before it is published.' This environmental assessment, which was first published in 2022 and later updated, is the crux of a lawsuit brought against the FAA by a coalition of non-profits. They say the assessment was not sufficient and violates the National Environmental Policy Act. The coalition is calling for the FAA to conduct what's known as an Environmental Impact Statement, which would require a more rigorous review of SpaceX's impact to endangered species as well as consultation with Native Hawaiians and other cultural groups. 'These documents were all put together by SpaceX, and then the FAA just sort of signed off on them as its own work,' said Jill Heaps, the senior legal director for the Surfrider Foundation, which is part of the coalition. 'It's the FAA's duty to take a hard look at the potentially significant impacts to marine life … They're asking for a very large geographic area in which these pieces can be dumped into the ocean, some of which might be near the Rice's whale, some of which are near very sensitive areas around Hawaii.' When asked why the FAA didn't issue an impact statement, the agency spokesperson said the assessment 'provides a full discussion of the reasonably foreseeable effects of issuing a license for SpaceX's proposed operations'. Rockets are a conglomeration of materials, such as heavy metals, plastics, wiring and chemicals. When one explodes, it typically breaks into several separate pieces, said Ella Atkins, a professor and department head of aerospace and ocean engineering at Virginia Tech. 'That includes the shell on the outside, and the fuel tanks and the engines and all of the piping … Whatever fuel that is still remaining that is unburned will come down wherever it is.' The big stainless steel side panels of the rocket could float for a while and be retrieved before they eventually sink, said Atkins. The denser pieces, like parts of the engine, would immediately plummet to the sea floor. She said all three of the explosive scenarios laid out by the FAA could harm marine life. Discarding those materials into the water could also have unforeseen consequences, said Britta Baechler, the director of ocean plastics research for the environmental non-profit Ocean Conservancy. Damaging a coral reef could kill not only the coral, but the ecosystem that depends on it, everything from marine mammals and birds to the fish they survive on, she said. 'Throughout history, we've looked at the ocean as a dumping ground, like it's too big to fail, like 'the solution to pollution is dilution,'' Baechler said. 'And that's really not the case.' SpaceX has an extensive history of scattering rocket ship debris into the ocean. In the early days of the company, it struggled to find permission to launch its rockets. So, in 2005, the company set its sights on a tiny, remote atoll in the Marshall Islands, called Kwajalein. In the four years SpaceX spent in Kwajalein, the company successfully launched two of its small Falcon 1 rockets for the first time. But it took several failures to get there. The inaugural Falcon 1 launch ended in a blaze with the rocket plummeting into the ocean, showering burning debris across a nearby coral reef. According to an account by Wired published in 2007, the spaceship's payload barreled through the roof of SpaceX's own machine shop, and a fuel slick spread offshore. The company said it retrieved 75% of the detonated debris. Since then, SpaceX has made tremendous strides. It has launched hundreds of Falcon rockets and is now responsible for delivering cargo and crew to and from the International Space Station. The company says it has also sent more than 7,800 Starlink satellites into orbit, more than half of all active satellites in space. Starship is SpaceX's new frontier – a rocket built with the goal of making it to Mars – but it's still a work in progress. The majority of its 10 test flights have encountered fatal errors, with the entire ship engulfed in flames and scant parts left to be reused. Musk has a 'fail fast, learn faster' approach to his companies. As far back as 2005, shortly before SpaceX got set up in Kwajalein Musk said in an interview that, 'There's a silly notion that failure's not an option at Nasa. Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.' Sign up to TechScape A weekly dive in to how technology is shaping our lives after newsletter promotion One spectacular SpaceX failure happened during the first test launch of Starship on 20 April 2023. The colossal spaceship took off from Boca Chica, but quickly suffered engine failure. Just above the Earth, the rocket started to spin out of control, and SpaceX was forced to detonate the ship. The problem started during takeoff, when Starship demolished its launchpad, pulverizing it, sending hunks of concrete flying six miles away. The blast ignited a grassfire that burned nearly four acres of state park and, from what is known, it destroyed a nest of bobwhite quail eggs and a collection of blue land crabs, according to internal emails Bloomberg obtained from the Fish and Wildlife Service. The loud boom also sent a pair of endangered snowy plovers fleeing, and, while they were gone, a wildlife scientist's 'game camera' caught a coyote eating two of their three nest eggs. The FAA blamed the failure on 'multiple root causes' and cited 63 actions SpaceX needed to implement, including the redesign of Starship's hardware to prevent leaks and fires as well as the redesign of its launchpad. According to the biography Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson, when SpaceX first built the launchpad in 2020, Musk demanded it not have a flame trench dug underneath the mount, as most pads have. 'We don't want to design to eliminate every risk,' Musk told Isaacson after the episode. 'Otherwise, we will never get anywhere.' In 2025 alone, four more of SpaceX's Starship rockets exploded. The first, in January, ignited into a fireball that lit up the sky from the Bahamas to Haiti. The FAA needed to reroute dozens of commercial airline flights to avoid falling debris. Afterwards, residents of Turks and Caicos said their islands were littered with spacecraft remains. SpaceX had originally planned a 'controlled splashdown' in the Indian Ocean an hour after takeoff, but the explosion happened just nine minutes into Starship's journey. 'Success is uncertain, but entertainment is guaranteed!' Musk posted to X. Then, in March, May and June, more Starships exploded. The May blast ended with heaps of debris, including combustion tanks and metal and plastic fragments, washing up on Playa Bagdad in Matamoros, Mexico – putting in jeopardy thousands of hatchling Kemp's ridley sea turtles, according to environmental groups. The Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, sent government officials to the beach to survey the damage. Meanwhile, the June Starship went up in flames. Days later, Sheinbaum threatened to sue SpaceX, concluding 'there is indeed contamination' on Playa Bagdad. In mid-January, the FAA held a virtual meeting on Musk's Starship plan that was open to the public. Texas and Hawaii residents logged on, most of whom were deeply opposed to the project. Lynda Williams, a retired physics professor and activist who lives in Hilo, Hawaii, was the first to speak. She had been trying for months to get word out about Musk's plans and wrote an op-ed emphasizing the fact that Hawaii residents and officials hadn't been consulted. During the meeting, Williams said she focused her comments on the idea that 'Earth is not a sacrifice zone for Elon Musk's ego trip to Mars'. She said she wanted to 'shred his [talking point about], you know, 'we have to extend the light of consciousness and go to fucking Mars', which is just a whole Trojan-Horse bullshit lie'. Several meeting participants spoke about the fact that SpaceX is a private commercial company using public resources for profit. The aerospace giant has received billions in government contracts and stands to be awarded much more. The majority of its funding is from Nasa and the Department of Defense. According to a Nasa spokesperson, the agency has invested more than $16bn in SpaceX through numerous contracts. The FAA also opened a written public comment period, and more than 12,000 comments poured in over a two-month period that ended on 17 January. Comments flowed from south Texas, where residents have lived with rumbling SpaceX launches and their deafening booms for half a decade. 'It is terrifying for residents to wake up to what feels like earthquakes,' said one commenter. Another pleaded, 'Please stop the destruction of our lands for profit.' Some people voiced support for the project, including dozens who used the same template to argue that quintupling rocket launches would help in 'maintaining American leadership in space relative to global competitors like China'. Several local suppliers also sent identical letters, but using their own letterhead. Just three days after the FAA closed the comment period on SpaceX's proposal, Trump was inaugurated president. One of his first official acts was to sign an executive order establishing the so-called 'department of government efficiency' (Doge). Trump anointed Musk the de-facto leader – essentially handing him control over the personnel of the federal agencies meant to regulate his businesses. Michael Whitaker, the FAA chief, stepped down that same day. He had long been in the crosshairs of Musk, especially after the agency fined SpaceX $633,000 last September for allegedly violating its launch license over safety protocols. Musk wrote on X that he was suing the FAA for 'regulatory overreach' and that 'the fundamental problem is that humanity will forever be confined to Earth unless there is radical reform at the FAA!' Days later, Musk posted Whitaker 'needs to resign'. Since then, with the backing of Trump, Doge has fired hundreds of FAA employees. It has also laid off thousands of scientists with deep cuts to Noaa and the Fish and Wildlife Service, both of which manage Papahānaumokuākea. The relationship between Trump and Musk has frayed, but Trump has continued to slash funding for environmental projects and attack regulatory bodies that protect the environment. In the Pacific, he has signed executive orders that allow for deep sea mining and open up the Pacific Islands Heritage marine national monument, which is adjacent to Papahānaumokuākea, for commercial fishing. 'The government is doing a number of things trying to reduce the influence and impact of environmental laws,' said Aila, the former chair of Papahānaumokuākea's advisory council. 'Who does that benefit? It benefits Elon Musk. And that should be a huge ethical issue.' Ancestors of the Hawaiians pioneered ocean exploration by the stars. But their culture of reverence could not be more different than Musk's 'fail fast' approach to space exploration. 'It's really easy to portray Indigenous Hawaiian ideals as anti-science, but I don't think it's that way at all,' said Kau'inohea Wawae'iole, a college student and resident of Puna, Hawaii, who said he was dismayed when he heard about SpaceX's plans. 'I think it's just that we have a really deep connection to this place.' Similarly, when Kyle Kajihiro heard about the waters around Papahānaumokuākea being used as a place to dump rocket debris, he said he was reminded of how the Pacific has been treated for centuries. He's an assistant professor of ethnic studies at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, whose family originally emigrated from Japan and has lived in Hawaii for five generations. 'There's a kind of way that the Pacific Ocean, Hawaii and other islands in the Pacific have been imagined by the powerful countries around the world as a kind of empty space,' Kajihiro said. 'It's like it's this vast ocean with these tiny, remote specs that are insignificant. And so, that smallness and that idea of remoteness and isolation and distance means that the area can be used in this way.' In the lead-up to the FAA granting approval for SpaceX's plan, the agency received a deluge of critical letters from local government bureaus, environmental groups and scientists, according to documents reviewed by the Guardian. One of those groups, the Surfrider Foundation, had been focused on SpaceX's impact in Texas but is now looking at the Pacific too. 'The [environmental assessment] fails to analyze the impacts of exploding metal rocket pieces or other hazardous materials to sea life, including the ocean water quality, in the vicinity of protected marine habitat, or those that ultimately sink to the sea floor,' Surfrider leaders wrote in their letter, adding that SpaceX has shown no evidence it will avoid areas with endangered species. In response, the FAA told Surfrider its assessment doesn't say all potential endangered species habitats would be avoided, 'as the ocean is vast and cannot be avoided'. The FAA did make a concession, however. With its approval in May, the agency adjusted some of the boundaries where Starship debris is allowed to fall near the main Hawaiian Islands. It also added a 50-mile buffer zone around Papahānaumokuākea. The FAA said it made these revisions based on the outpouring of comments about harm to marine life and Hawaiian cultural resources, like the cluster of ancient religious sites on Mokumanamana. Kajihiro said that even though there are now boundaries around these sacred areas, he's still concerned that Starship rockets could malfunction and debris will fall there. 'They just see this as empty space,' Kajihiro reiterated. 'But what Native Hawaiians have helped us to understand, and what other Pacific Island peoples in their history have understood, is that the ocean is really a fabric of connection between all of these civilizations.'

Clerics Accuse West Bank Israeli Settlers of Attacking Christian Sites
Clerics Accuse West Bank Israeli Settlers of Attacking Christian Sites

Asharq Al-Awsat

time15-07-2025

  • Politics
  • Asharq Al-Awsat

Clerics Accuse West Bank Israeli Settlers of Attacking Christian Sites

Christian leaders accused Israeli settlers on Monday of attacking sacred sites in the West Bank, in violence that one said was forcing some to consider quitting the occupied territory. The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III - visiting the Christian town of Taybeh with other Jerusalem-based clerics - said settlers had started a fire near a cemetery and a 5th century church there last week. "These actions are a direct and intentional threat to our local community ... but also to the historic and religious heritage," the patriarch told diplomats and journalists at a press conference in Taybeh. Settlers had also attacked homes in the area, he said. "We call for an immediate and transparent investigation on why the Israeli police did not respond to emergency calls from the local community and why these abhorrent actions continue to go unpunished," he added. Israel's government spokesperson did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Israel's government had previously said that any acts of violence by civilians are unacceptable and that individuals should not take the law into their own hands. During the visit, the heads of the churches led locals in prayer as candles flickered in the ruins of the 5th century church of St George. They spoke with residents who described their fears. B'Tselem and other rights groups say settler violence in the West Bank has risen since the start of Israel's war against Palestinian group Hamas in Gaza in late 2023. Dozens of Israelis have also been killed in Palestinian street attacks in recent years and the Israeli military has intensified raids across the West Bank. Palestinian health authorities and witnesses said two men, including a US citizen, were killed by settlers during a confrontation on Friday night. Fears over violence were pushing Christians to leave the West Bank, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Roman Catholic Patriarch of Jerusalem since 2020, said. "Unfortunately, the temptation to emigrate is there because of the situation," he added. "This time it's very difficult to see how and when this will finish, and especially for the youth to talk about hope, trust for the future." Around 50,000 Christian Palestinians live in Jerusalem and in the West Bank, an area that includes many of the faith's most sacred sites including Bethlehem where believers say Jesus was born. Around 700,000 Israeli settlers live among 2.7 million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, territories Israel captured from Jordan in the 1967 war, which Palestinians see as part of a future state.

The consulting firm allegedly offering private deals and collecting signatures to smooth way for Empire Energy gas sales
The consulting firm allegedly offering private deals and collecting signatures to smooth way for Empire Energy gas sales

The Guardian

time23-06-2025

  • General
  • The Guardian

The consulting firm allegedly offering private deals and collecting signatures to smooth way for Empire Energy gas sales

In late August 2024, a curious letter arrived at the Darwin office of Benedict Scambary, chief executive of the Aboriginal Areas Protection Authority (AAPA). The correspondence was typed and written in corporate style but it was attached to four and a half pages of handwritten names and signatures of traditional land owners from across the Northern Territory's Top End. A name that Scambary recognised was written on the back of the envelope – William John, a Mudburra Jingili man. As the head of the NT agency responsible for protecting Aboriginal sacred sites, Scambary was familiar with many of the signatories' names. But what was unusual was the contents of the letter – it contradicted earlier advice AAPA had been given from several of the signatories regarding the protection of their cultural heritage. The letter asked Scambary to explain why AAPA had stopped processing an application by the gas company Empire Energy for an authority certificate it needed at the site of its Carpentaria pilot project, a fracking operation near Cape Crawford in the Beetaloo basin. Authority certificates set conditions for developers working on or near sacred sites in the NT and are mandatory before fracking projects can progress. Empire Energy's application for the Carpentaria project had been delayed after heritage concerns were raised by traditional owners. But the letter, which was leaked to Guardian Australia as part of a trove of documents from the Northern Land Council, asked Scambary to progress Empire Energy's certificate 'as soon as possible'. When the Guardian approached Scambary he said that after receiving the letter, AAPA staff felt it was necessary to contact the relevant traditional owners and custodians again, to clarify their positions. He said it emerged from those discussions that most of the signatures had been gathered at two meetings held in August by Empire Energy and a consulting firm called Good Advice. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email But when AAPA officials read the letter to some of the people whose names were attached to it, the traditional owners did not agree with its contents. 'The custodians were not aware of what they had signed, and were alarmed by the letter's denial of their concerns about cultural heritage,' Scambary said. The traditional owners AAPA spoke to did not deny they had signed the sheet of paper but they gave differing accounts of what they thought they were signing. According to the leaked material, one thought he was merely signing an attendance sheet. The purported sender of the letter, whose name appeared on the back of the envelope, also insists he did not send it. When the Guardian contacted John, he said: 'It wasn't [sent] by me.' On 15 August 2024, at an outback pub on the Carpentaria Highway called the Heartbreak Hotel, a meeting was held between traditional owners and Empire Energy. The gathering at the remote pit stop, where travellers share a drink on their long journeys across the Top End, had been organised by Good Advice – a consulting firm hired by the gas company to help navigate relationships with traditional owners and other stakeholders. Several of the attendees had arrived on a bus that it's understood was facilitated by the firm's sole director, Greg McDonald. Two days earlier, McDonald had held a similar meeting on Empire's behalf with a different group of traditional owners 400km away in the pastoral town of Mataranka, known for its thermal pools. Accounts of exactly what happened at the meetings differ but there are several common threads. A major leak of Northern Land Council files, correspondence and recordings to Guardian Australia contains claims that traditional owners were offered financial benefits if they agreed to let Empire Energy sell 'appraisal gas' – which is gas collected during the exploration phase – from its Carpentaria pilot project in the Beetaloo basin. The leaked files reveal serious concerns among traditional owners and bureaucrats about the lobbying activities of Empire Energy, Good Advice and several members of the NLC's full council, who were employed as advisers by the consulting firm. According to claims made in the leaked material, the meetings ran an agenda favourable to Empire Energy's aims and presented unrealistic promises of large royalties and other benefits. Traditional owners were allegedly told payments could be agreed privately with the gas company, outside the usual land rights process overseen by the land council. Some traditional owners said they recalled signing a document – which would later be attached to the letter to AAPA – but one claimed he 'thought he was signing up for the money' that was allegedly promised, according to the documents, and another said he thought he was signing up to join an organisation. The documents include claims that some of the attendees were confused about the meetings and their purpose. It's understood some were confused in part because they recognised McDonald from his previous position at the NLC, where he worked until 2023. Consultation meetings between traditional owners and gas companies are part of the usual process before fracking projects in the Top End can progress. But official consultations are facilitated by the NLC – the federal agency that oversees gas exploration on land covered by the land rights and native title acts – not by independent consulting firms. With McDonald at the Heartbreak Hotel were executives from the gas company but also – according to traditional owner accounts – at least two current members of the NLC's full council, which is the main decision making body for the agency. Adding to the confusion was the timing of the meetings, which was shortly before actual formal land council consultation sessions about the potential sale of exploration gas from Empire's Carpentaria pilot project were due to start in late August. Sources not authorised to speak publicly told the Guardian that many of the attendees claim they did not know that Good Advice and McDonald had been hired by Empire Energy. Three weeks after the meetings, chair of the NLC, Matthew Ryan, wrote to the managing director of the gas company to say traditional owners had raised concerns that it might be trying to 'circumvent processes under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act using consultants associated with Good Advice or Mr McDonald'. In a letter seen by the Guardian, Ryan wrote that the 'common themes' raised with the NLC included claims Good Advice was facilitating meetings for Empire Energy with individuals who 'may or may not be council members of the Land Council' present and 'attempting to pass off the meetings as Land Council meetings'. He said traditional owners had claimed that Empire, via Good Advice, was 'facilitating payments or promising payments' to them outside the agreements negotiated with the NLC through the land rights process. McDonald worked for the NLC for just over a decade from 2012, according to federal Senate records. In the years leading up to his departure on 24 March 2023, he was the manager of the resources and energy branch, which oversees the land council's duties and functions as they relate to the resources and energy sector. On 12 April 2023 he registered the company Good Advice Pty Ltd. The company has no website. McDonald's sparse LinkedIn profile says he is the managing director with skills in 'bespoke solutions'. He did not respond to the Guardian's questions. But it is apparent from public records that Good Advice's services involve helping gas companies navigate their relationships with traditional owners in the Top End, people with whom McDonald had formed relationships while at the land council. It's not uncommon for bureaucrats to move from public service into private consulting roles. To assist with his work, McDonald has recruited several members of the NLC's full council, which is made up of 83 Aboriginal councillors from the Top End. In a response submitted to a government consultation, obtained by the Guardian under freedom of information laws, McDonald described Good Advice as a supplier to the offshore resources industry that was founded 'with a vision to facilitate and assist First Nations persons to engage with the private and public sectors in a culturally appropriate manner' and to 'support the informed consultation and participation of First Nations in relation to proposed industrial developments and policy development'. McDonald wrote that Good Advice used the services of 'consultant cultural advisors' who were a 'dynamic team of experienced persons, from elected representatives to ceremonial leaders'. The NLC councillors who are identified in the leaked documents as allegedly working for Good Advice did not respond to questions from the Guardian. The NLC's chief executive Yuseph Deen said councillors were considered 'part-time public officials' who often wore many hats and 'are entitled to engage in outside employment opportunities in an individual capacity'. He said the land council 'provides regular governance training for council members, to ensure that members are aware of their duty to declare and manage conflicts of interest appropriately'. 'When council members are engaged in an individual capacity, they are not authorised to speak for, or on behalf of, the NLC.' In the days leading up to the Heartbreak Hotel meeting, McDonald and three NLC councillors were seen 'going around town and the town camps' approaching people, according to claims made in a consultant's report that was part of the leaked documents. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion One traditional owner claims in the report that the NLC councillors canvassing people in community were wearing their NLC shirts: 'They came here telling people about fracking being OK, they were wearing NLC shirts,' he is quoted as saying. William John, the traditional owner whose name was on the envelope of the letter sent to AAPA, told the Guardian that before he attended the meeting in Mataranka he had also been visited during a stay in Darwin by McDonald and three NLC councillors. 'They didn't give me any advice. What they want me to do: accept getting gas out of my land. But I didn't want to do that,' he claimed. 'They said anything I want they would do: paying me money; getting me [a] vehicle to go visit my land, fuel, money, whatever. 'They talked about the gas, getting the money out of the gas. 'I'd like someone to help stop what they're doing.' The independent senator Lidia Thorpe has asked questions in parliament over the past year about the relationship between Good Advice, the gas industry and some NLC councillors and whether there were potential conflicts of interest in those relationships. In answers to questions on notice from Thorpe, the NLC has said five of its councillors have declared conflicts with Good Advice, with four in paid roles. At Senate estimates in November, the NLC was asked follow-up questions by Thorpe and said it had now introduced a conflict of interest register for members. 'Conflicts of interest are part of governance, but we are talking about people being paid what are likely very large sums of money by gas companies,' Thorpe said at the hearing. 'These people were on a statutory body that is supposed to be representing traditional owners in negotiations with gas companies. 'So, you've got someone being paid by a gas company but then they're also in there negotiating with the gas company about destroying country by fracking it. 'How can the community be confident that conflicts of interest are being managed if some of our mob are being paid by the very companies that are destroying our land, and then these fullas are going in there negotiating with the same companies?' The NLC responded: 'As a management action, all five NLC council members agreed to leave the room during any discussions or decisions regarding their conflicts.' Thorpe told the Guardian: 'If you're on the land council then you should be looking after the people you represent. And you need to be ensuring you have permission to make certain decisions that affect country or water or people.' When it came time for the land council to hold its official consultation sessions about Empire's proposal to sell appraisal gas in late August, traditional owners, including a Wuyaliya man, Asman Rory, raised their concerns with the company about the AAPA letter and the meetings at Mataranka and the Heartbreak Hotel. At one of those consultation sessions, in the remote community of Borroloola, Rory said to the company's managing director Alex Underwood: 'Greg McDonald got signatures of land trust members on a letter pushing your way forward … it's a very wrong way.' Underwood allegedly responded: '[That is] simply a document from a range of people for whom we are simply seeking to get [the] AAPA process going again.' He said the company had 'been transparent' and that it worked with Good Advice because 'we are simply trying to re-establish relationships'. Rory, who is a cultural lawman for his country, told the Guardian he had not attended the Heartbreak Hotel meeting but he and his partner had been visited at home by McDonald and some NLC councillors. On the day of the meeting he said he was concerned when he was at the local shops and saw some of his family members being guided on to a bus by McDonald. 'I pulled into the shop when he was loading everybody on and I said, 'What's going on here, mate?'' he said. Rory said McDonald explained they were going to Heartbreak Hotel to meet Empire Energy to discuss the gas proposal. 'And I said it's no good for you to do this. You're taking that responsibility away from me.' At the consultation session, it's understood a senior NLC executive told Empire: 'We have been getting questions about whether there were NLC meetings last week. People are finding this confusing and I am finding this confusing.' The land council's chair then wrote to Underwood on 4 September. In that letter, Ryan asked the gas company for an explanation of the nature of its engagement of Good Advice and for detail about individuals Good Advice or McDonald had engaged as consultants. In a reply on 5 September, Empire's managing director Underwood said that he and members of his management team had been told by traditional owners and other stakeholders that 'environmental activist groups have been actively engaging with them' to prevent the development of the Carpentaria project and 'spreading serious misinformation'. He said the company had hired Good Advice on a short term contract on 24 July to 'ensure that all relevant stakeholders are receiving accurate information'. He said the company had notified the land council it had intended to engage the consulting firm and its role was to identify and engage with traditional owners and other stakeholders, manage relations and facilitate the company's engagement with government agencies. He rejected each of the allegations put to him by Ryan and said the company was not seeking to circumvent the Land Rights Act and had not engaged in private negotiations with traditional owners via Good Advice. He said that at the meetings he was present at, and to the best of his knowledge at all other meetings, traditional owners had been told the purpose was for information and discussion only, no negotiations were to take place at those meetings and they were not official land council meetings. He said neither the company nor Good Advice had attempted to pass the meetings off as official land council meetings and had 'never either directly or via Good Advice or Mr McDonald, facilitated or promised to make payments to Traditional Owners outside of the agreements negotiated with the NLC'. He said the company took its obligations under the Land Rights act seriously and its activities with Good Advice were 'an attempt to build our relationships with traditional owners and other stakeholders'. 'I and my team did not seek to cause offence, and if there is any I apologise.' Empire Energy's spokesperson told the Guardian that the company had 'a long history of respectful engagement with Traditional Owners over the last decade'. He said it had held more than 30 on-country meetings and continued to consult traditional owners about current and future works. Guardian Australia sent detailed questions to McDonald via email and post, to give him the opportunity to respond to the claims made about Good Advice's consulting work. He declined to respond. The NLC's Yuseph Deen told the Guardian the land council had a legislated responsibility to ensure traditional owners had the opportunity 'to give their free, prior, and informed consent to a [development] proposal; or to exercise their rights to say no'. 'Proponents who come on to Country, wanting to do business with Aboriginal people, are expected to act ethically and responsibly at all times,' he said. Speaking generally without reference to Empire, Good Advice or McDonald, Scambary said the NT had seen 'an increase in land users attempting to sidestep the work of [AAPA] and privately negotiate with Aboriginal custodians'. 'Whilst the Authority welcomes strong relationships between land users and the custodians of that land, these actions are very concerning,' he said. 'Private consultation, where conflicting and sometimes undisclosed commercial interests are at play, creates confusion and division within communities. It erodes confidence in sacred site protection and undermines certainty for developers, the public and custodians of sacred sites.' Scambary said AAPA existed to 'ensure that Aboriginal sacred sites are protected and that development occurs responsibly, transparently and lawfully'. 'Bypassing the Aboriginal Areas Protection Authority not only endangers sacred sites, it puts projects and reputations at risk.' Do you know more? Email

Documenting sacred ecology: Mamelodi to Rustenburg Kloof conservation walk begins
Documenting sacred ecology: Mamelodi to Rustenburg Kloof conservation walk begins

Mail & Guardian

time18-06-2025

  • General
  • Mail & Guardian

Documenting sacred ecology: Mamelodi to Rustenburg Kloof conservation walk begins

Ecological threats in the Magaliesberg have spurred the community-led conservation effort. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G) A unique project to document the conditions at sacred natural sites and traditional ecological knowledge from Mamelodi to Rustenburg Kloof began on Monday. It comes after Despite its Unesco Biosphere status, the Magaliesberg faces growing threats from mining, urban expansion, tree felling, water pollution and a lack of environmental education. Dzerefos's project, in partnership with traditional healer Ephraim Cebisa Mabena, is a culturally grounded response. It will document conditions at sacred natural sites such as in Majakaneng Kloof, Barnardsvlei and Kgaswane Mountain Reserve. Mabena will lead discussions with traditional healers, church groups and holy water collectors to explore how spiritual practices can align with sustainable environmental use. His ties to the Magaliesberg and his The project responds to alarming developments such as the 'These events highlight the disconnect between top-down policy and local spiritual users. The initiative uses a participatory model where Dr Mabena interprets environmental conditions and threats through a cultural lens, identifying sacred ecological signs and proposing culturally appropriate responses,' they said. Dzerefos will document the process, ensure ethical standards and translate findings into tools that can influence land use policy and eco-literacy. 'This project is about restoring our relationship and appreciation of natural areas,' she said. 'Through Dr Mabena's leadership, we hope to find ways to maintain the Magaliesberg's pristine water and habitat for leopard, baboon, birds of prey and other indigenous animal and plant species that still exist in the Magaliesberg.' Mabena noted: 'This walk is just to indicate that as a human being living on this Earth, I'm a part, not apart from biodiversity, therefore it is my task to make sure that I protect this planet. And this walk, to me, is just to try to activate our ancient wisdom into activism that can give birth to alternative ways that can be beneficial to all of us in saving our planet, especially our sacred spaces and our flora and fauna.' The walk is to trigger the spirit of working among healers 'as indigenous knowledge custodians, as creative thinkers, as artists, as scholars and visionaries and wisdom holders' to protect sacred spaces and natural resources. Mabena emphasised the importance of schools, colleges and universities to develop academic courses on the importance of sacred sites. '[This is] because such sites are to me outdoor educational centres; places like sacred sites and protected areas are a mirror to us where we see ourselves. How can we encourage communities to be guardians of such sacred places and protected areas?' He dedicated the walk to 'all who came before me, before us, in protecting such sacred spaces. These natural resources, like the Magaliesberg mountains, it's a place of wilderness, of wars … There are The project launched at Mamelodi Mountain on Monday with the symbolic planting of Kei apple, which was attended by environmental historian

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