Fracking the Hawkwoods near Calgary, dead cows and…RADIATION? by Damien Gillis, November 8, 2013, Commonsensecanadian.ca
Dead spots, dead cows
Howard describes their experience to program host David Kattenberg of the Green Planet Monitor – including 1-2 acres of dead patches on their farm, which tests reveal contain alarming levels of radioactivity. (Listen to the full program here – Howard’s interview begins at the 19 min mark)
“Towards calving season, we noticed some cows weren’t doing that great…Then all the sudden these cows started to crash – they would go down and they wouldn’t get up,” Hawkwood explains. “We did blood testing on these cows and we found out the sodium and the chlorides were out of balance, so I asked the veterinarian, ‘So, what do we do?’. And the vet did some research and we don’t know. We don’t know how to handle this.”
Howard Hawkwood, Jessica Ernst and Magic on Hawkwood’s ranch in the Lochend. Photos by David Kattenburg, Greenplanetmonitor
Twelve Canadians – Fracking Experiments in Sacrifice Zones, Fear & Loathing in Canadian Frackland by David Kattenburg, November 8, 2013, greenplanetmonitor
Howard Hawkwood and one of his dead cows on his ranch in the Lochend, Rocky View County, Alberta on October 19, 2013. Photo by David Kattenburg, Greenplanetmonitor
No one knows better how troublesome frack emissions can be than people living in the vicinity of their release, in rural spots some refer to as “sacrifice zones.” Howard and Nielle Hawkwood are among these. Howard and Nielle raise cattle just outside Airdrie, Alberta, a half hour drive north of Calgary. This year something seems to have sickened and killed a tenth of their herd, including one 4 year-old cow found dead on the day of the above audio recording (see photo below). Nielle has lost her hair, as have a dozen other women and girls in the area, Nielle reports.
Listen to Howard and Nielle’s story here