203 Zosh Road

Since I am occasionally in this precise area, I have been scouting this location for a few months and have had absolutely nothing to report. As we know, this location in Lake Township is probably next up on the growing list of properties to be hacked, jacked and fracked.

But as the pictures show, we now have some activity on Zosh Road.

This is interesting. The heavy equipment has not been widening this narrow road, nor is it there as part of a paving project. Rather, they dug across the road in a few places just a few feet north of the drilling site, ran 12' plastic drainage lines under the road, and then smoothed things back over. Huh?

What? After the drilling begins, are they anticipating irrigation issues? Or is this more about creating waste water runoff opportunities? Who'd know if a few gallons of Allah only knows what drained away into the forested land?

Call me skeptical, but I found that to be damn curious.

This following picture is 203 Zosh Road. As we can see, the utility lines are being located and marked by the respective utilities.

This next picture is of the cutout through the forest that is an existing high-pressure gas line. This spot is directly across the road from the utility markings and surveyor stakes in the tall grass and all of that pre-construction stuff.

Or should I say, pre-destruction?

I read a few newspapers stories about how some of the Back Mountain folks were objecting to having gas lines running through or near their properties for the purposes of exporting the extracted natural gas. Somehow, I was envisioning above ground pipelines. Not subterranean pipelines.

So which is it? Is this a perfect scenario, a lucky break were the sub-slab line just happens to be sitting next to a favored extraction point? Or was this planned?

I think we need some clarification on this one, being that explosions and fires seem to be a regular part of the fracking program. There's a residence at 190 Zosh Road, pretty darn close to the site of the future drilling. And pretty darn close to the high-pressure gas line. And do we want to be mowing that lawn when a wellhead blows out?

I mentioned it some weeks ago, but as a training vehicle I was treated to numerous photos of the destructive and fatal aftermath of a high-pressure gas line that was augured through. And the blast radius was bigger than Wilkes-Barre's downtown. High-pressure gas lines, explosions, fires, ah, what's not to like?

That reminds me, how's that moratorium on drilling coming?

Somebody call this region's preeminent expert on Marcellus Shale issues--Steve "I am whatever annoys my audience!" Corbett on the phone and see what he has to mispronounce about it?

Doesn't matter anyway. Even a precursory glance towards Washington D.C. suggests we'll all be broke, ruined and suicidal long before Zosh Road makes like a firestorm.

Bye