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The Federal Bureau of Investigation is leading an investigation into two allegedly suspicious fires: one at a drilling site in Wisconsin where Canadian energy company Enbridge is diverting its Line 5 pipeline and oil, and another at a company office in Superior, Wisconsin.
At 6:28 a.m. on Sept. 17, the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office and Ashland Fire Department responded to Gingles Township, Wis., in Ashland County, where they located an equipment trailer and two boring machines involved in a fire, according to a news release from the Sheriff’s Office.
Earlier that week, on Sept. 14, at about 1:41 a.m., the Superior Police Department and Superior Fire Department responded to Enbridge Energy’s Great Lakes office at 119 N. 25th Street East on a report of “visible flames and smoke coming from the building,” according to a fire department news release.
The fire was on the roof, according to Enbridge. There were no injuries in either incident. Damage cost estimates are not yet available.
“How the firefighters worked to put out the fire [in Superior]officers on scene noticed graffiti on signs and on the building,” the Superior Fire Department said, though it did not specify what the graffiti said.
“The FBI, along with our local, state and federal partners, are investigating the cause of the fires … We have no further information to provide at this time,” Caroline Clancy, public affairs officer for the FBI’s Milwaukee Division, said in a statement.
Ashlee Sherrill, spokeswoman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, added that “ATF is working to determine the origin and cause, as well as other matters.”
Enbridge spokesman Juli Kellner said the company is taking the fires seriously.
“Enbridge supports everyone’s right to express their opinions lawfully and peacefully about the energy we all use every day,” he said in a statement. “These incidents were neither lawful nor peaceful. The illegal and unsafe acts of criminal saboteurs put themselves, the local community, first responders and our workers at risk.
He added that Enbridge will seek to prosecute those involved to the fullest extent of the law.
Concerns about the pipeline’s safety and potential environmental impacts were heightened in August when an unoccupied, parked, third-party-owned semi truck drove into an excavation site on the east side of the pipeline in Saxon, Wis., about 40 miles from where the fire broke out. The truck hit a bypass valve, causing a natural gas spill of about 1.3 million gallons.
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Enbridge Line 5 Tracking
Eight years of ENR reports
ENR has pursued Line 5 from the proposed Great Lakes Tunnel through permitting, tribal litigation, and construction of the Wisconsin route.
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Enbridge is building a $1 billion, 41-mile pipeline segment to bypass tribal lands in Wisconsin, while still operating a disputed 12-mile pipeline segment on reservation land owned by the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. This segment is currently in legal proceedings to have it removed. The pipeline is part of a network that brings oil and gas from Canada to the US
Following the accident, Line 5 was closed to clean up the spill and create a bypass around the damaged section. It reopened on September 15.
Earthjustice, which represents several Wisconsin tribal nations in legal battles to protect treaty rights, water quality and sacred lands from industrial and environmental threats, condemned the alleged suspicious fires.
“We are learning about it [the fires] “Standing with all of you,” said Earthjustice spokeswoman Timna Axel. “To the extent that they may be intentional acts, as a legal organization we would unequivocally condemn any illegality.”
Kellner said most Enbridge staff had already moved out of the Great Lakes office when the fire occurred and the company was in the process of selling it to a learning academy.
