On August 5, activists paddled a flotilla of kayaks and canoes from Fish Creek, Wisconsin, to its outlet in Lake Superior. Members of the Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians and other Indigenous activists and allies had gathered to demand that the seventy-year-old Enbridge Line 5 oil and gas pipeline be shut down immediately. The Bad River Band had refused to renew permission for Line 5 to traverse their land and, in June, won against Enbridge in court, with a district judge ruling it had trespassed on Ojibwe land.
In 2021, Michigan’s Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer ordered Enbridge to shut down the portions of Line 5 that pass under the Straits of Mackinac because of the imminent danger of the pipeline leaking into Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. Despite this, two years later, the oil flow continues.
The Fish Creek protest was one of several recent demonstrations led by water defenders in Wisconsin and Michigan, in opposition to Line 5 as well as Line 3, a separate Enbridge-owned pipeline that transports tar sands oil from Alberta, Canada.
Susan Simensky Bietila
Water defenders prepare to paddle to Lake Superior on August 5.
Susan Simensky Bietila
Paper-mache fish sculptures, crafted in previous years, were strapped to some canoes as nautical figureheads.
Susan Simensky Bietila
A “WE STAND” mural that was made by activists in Ashland, Wisconsin, on August 4 and displayed along a nearby highway.
Susan Simensky Bietila
There were also fish hats.
Susan Simensky Bietila
A giant dancer puppet, titled “Mindamooye,” stands in front of Lake Michigan during the Water Is Life festival in Petoskey, Michigan, on September 2.
Susan Simensky Bietila
An anti-pipeline banner in production.
Susan Simensky Bietila
A concert stage at the Michigan Water Is Life festival.