News update! Just north of Huachuca city, on Hwy 90, there is a massive shipping container storage yard. There is a frantic effort being made right now to remove all the containers. Road crews have even blocked off one entire lane of traffic to allow trucks to come and go unimpeded.
The containers are being taken to the Arizona State Prison Complex at Tucson, according to someone who followed one of the trucks.
Media: contact for image licensing.
A great editorial that, appropriately, credits protesters with stopping the wall while the legal process goes through. As some of us feared, the state and feds may try to compromise by removing the container wall and replacing it with an official wall.
Neither is acceptable and protesters at the camp have vowed to resist any attempts to further bisect the borderlands with unnecessary, ineffective and destructive barriers.
Took a town day and got a bunch of photos up on my website, with short captions. This was all done hurriedly, so I'll be adding more soon, with more descriptions and detailed explanations.
December 16 Ocelot Camp #ContainerWall protest update! We still have a great turn out and support is building. At this point, it looks like we have permanently stopped this phase of construction just by being here ready to blockade.
The next phase will be making sure that this travesty wall is not replaced by another "official" one.
As the #NoWall #protest movement here builds, we are planning ahead for the next phase. The Forest Service has informally told us that they consider this environmental mess an emergency situation and are committed to remediating it as soon as they have the legal go ahead.
Unfortunately, there has already been talk of replacing it with a Trump-era mega wall or other barrier. This is completely unacceptable, ineffective, wasteful, destructive, and completely unnecessary for #border security.
Protest the container wall this Sunday!
If you're interested in learning more, seeing this container wall, monstrosity for yourself, or being part of a protest against it, come here this Sunday! We're having a protest rally to demand it's immediate removal.
No Border Wall protest today at Ocelot Camp. There's a slow stream of people showing up, a new banner, and some cool, free T-shirts with the No Border Wall logo.
So far this morning we've had a drive-by visit from the border patrol, a small private plane, and a green military helicopter. None of them seemed particularly hostile, though.
About 4-dozen people showed up today to celebrate this victory against AZ Governor Ducey's political stunt container wall.
Currently, construction is at a complete standstill because of protester blockades and is unlikely to continue because the governor will be replaced by Democratic governor-elect Katie Hobbs and the feds have filed a legal complaint. Some info on the complaint can be found in this article.
Unless something changes, I'll end this thread for now. We decided on Sunday to disband Camp Ocelot, the #ContainerWall protest camp, since we can be almost completely certain that this monstrosity has been defeated.
Many of the #protesters live locally, so will be patrolling daily to be sure there are no changes in activity.
Now we're waiting for the legal challenges to play out so the Forest Service can remove the wall and remediate the damage.
Photos on my site: https://www.mikaljakubal.com/container-wall-protest/
Woo hoo! The protest victory is now formal.
A stipulated agreement in the DOJ's lawsuit against the State of Arizona and outgoing Governor Ducey to remove the container wall.
Discussions about removal on the Coronado National Forest section, where the protests were, are to start in a week. Yuma area containers will be removed by January 4th. They aren't messing around.
What remains to be seen is if they try to begin construction of a new wall once the containers are removed.
#ContainerWall update. The USFS has issued a closure order for the area around the border for the duration of the container removal process. I've asked for official permission to photograph the process, but was punted to DoJ, who hasn't returned my inquiry. I've written again to the Coronado National Forest and am awaiting a reply.
Any #press or #reporters here have any tips on not getting stonewalled? I suspect they'll deny me since I don't any official credentials.
https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/fseprd1080771.pdf
The ridiculous thing here is that I'm 100% supportive of the efforts to remove the containers and remediate the site, so it's not like they have anything to worry about.
The closure order is about 1,000' feet away from the work area, so well within drone range, but I want to match up before/after photos with the ones I've already got on the ground.
Any tips on organizations who might be able to help with press access welcome!
Okay, wait! If you thought the $95 million Arizona #ContainerWall that will be taken down starting Jan. 4th was a sick joke, wait till you hear the punch line!
The company contracted to build it, AshBritt, is getting another $57 million — no bid contract! — to dismantle it, despite continuing work after being told they were in open violation of federal law (it is a state contract).
You can download the contract here.
https://app.az.gov/page.aspx/en/ctr/contract_manage_public/60412
The last days of the #ContainerWall along the US - Mexico #border in southern #Arizona. Looking west into the sunset just now.
I spent the afternoon driving up and down, adding to my stock photo collection of this weird outdoor sculpture. And then, just before sunset did a long drone flight over it.
I considered camping out, but I think I'm going to head back to the interstate and go west to home or east to El Paso to photograph the container wall there tomorrow.
Happy new year, I guess.
I feel a little dorky about this shot. The sun had set and thought the best of the sunset was over, but wanted to go for a short walk and had never been all the way up this road. "Meh, I won't bother bringing my tripod and real camera. Phone is good enough."
Now I need to get back up there and get this same view with better gear, but between weather, the 3.5 hour drive to get there and the pending federal closure I'll have to violate, it'll be more work than it had to be.
Well, the demolition of the #ContainerWall has begun. The Forest Service has consistently refused to respond to any reasonable request for a press pass.
There is a legitimate, compelling public interest in this project being documented. I have no intention of not doing so. The bureaucrats are being blindingly stupid about it. They're blocking protesters, photographers, environmentalists and local residents from observing the work. These are all allies that they are about to make into enemies.
Update: I just heard that they are working on a special press pass for a limited time slot one day per week. This is absolutely not acceptable under any circumstances.
If anyone has suggestions for attorneys that deal with press freedom in situations like this, please connect us.
Consider this about the #ContainerWall: this is an event of considerable historical significance. It's of news significance now, but will be more interesting over time.
Depriving photojournalists the ability to extensively document the entire process — not just the staged shots the Forest Service wants — not only deprives the present public of adequate information, but it deprives the future as well.
I've been around long enough to recognize an important event the I see it.
Border Wall Resistance (the group that coalesced around stopping the container wall) has issued a press release calling for the Coronado National Forest to allow concerned citizens and photojournalists to freely observe the removal of the #ContainerWall.
If you're on Facebook or Twitter, the Coronado National Forest has accounts on both. Maybe politely say hi if you believe this should be documented.
Contacts:
[email protected]
https://borderwallresistance.com
(Full text in alt.)
A couple days ago I was able to arrange access to the #ContainerWall through a ranch in Mexico. This involved driving to Cananea, 1.5 hours of dirt road to the ranch, getting up at 4:30 am, driving another 1-14 hours on dirt roads to the border and then hiking cross country to where the work was happening.
The Coronado National Forest still will not give me or any other photographers access, though they've now given it to environmentalists as "volunteer observers."
Anyway, it looks like in order to continue to document the dismantling of the #ContainerWall, I'll have to keep making trips to Mexico when I can. It's a long, ridiculous, roundabout trip and will require increasingly long cross country hikes as the containers are removed eastward, but I'll do what I have to do. And the USFS cannot do anything about it.
I doubt it'll ever make me a dime, but I will undoubtedly have the most complete documentation of the ridiculous episode.
The #ContainerWall loading area from above, just after dawn this morning.
The containers are dismantled from the wall a mile and a half away, loaded onto massive 8-wheel drive military flatbeds, brought here, unloaded and then reloaded onto gooseneck flatbed trailers pulled by large pickup trucks. They are taken about 50 miles away to a storage yard near Whetstone, AZ.
#drone #photography
The #ContainerWall this morning. If you look way out past the end of the wall, you can see the strip of dirt where more containers used to be. It's likely to take them 2-3 more weeks to finish removing all the containers. The predicted rain over the next several days may hamper work for a while.
The Coronado National Forest let this happen without interfering, but now will not allow environmentalists or any media — independent or credentialed — into the area to document the removal.
The #ContainerWall from Mexico on January 10th at dawn. Because the Coronado National Forest has closed the work site and prohibited anyone entry into the area, I and others have made the long trip through Mexico and cross-country to the site to document the dismantling of the wall and removal of the containers.
The Forest Service is acting like they have something to hide—but they really don't! And if they did, this photo shows that we'd see it anyway. The security guard was chill.
I'm going for a bike ride, but I'll post a bunch more photos on my website tonight.
It's an interesting experience shooting from the Mexican side. It's nice having the Huachuca Mountains in the background.
This barbed wire fence and the "Normandy barrier," aka vehicle barrier (previous photo), is what has been along most of the border since the early 2000s. It adds a hassle for vehicles, though it can still be cut through or ramped over, but it allows wildlife and water to move freely.
Lots of new #ContainerWall photos up on my website. If you've seen the earlier ones, scroll down to the "Dismantling of the Container Wall" headline. That's where the new photos start. I wouldn't bother reading the text, since I needed to hack something out quickly and will edit it better later. But it gives an explanation of what I've had to go through to get these shots.
Camping out near the #ContainerWall tonight so I can be along the road where the trucks are hauling the containers out at first light. I have several shots on my list, then I'll go to the edge of the closure and fire up my drone and get some aerial photos of the dismantling work.
Temperature tonight is supposed to be 26°F 🥶🥶
No one can say I am not dedicated! My guess is the last container will be gone in about two weeks. I'll be making more Mexico trips and more drone flights.
Reviewing the photos from yesterday, eh, it's a mix. I got some of what I wanted, but not exactly. I'll have to back for one more dusty-road series.
This pic shows the road out of the National Forest just after dawn and the massive dust clouds that fill the San Rafael Valley as caravans of trucks haul the containers out.
I'm guessing the wall will be completely gone in 10-14 days. I'll keep shooting till then.
The #ContainerWall is almost gone. As of the end of work yesterday, January 27th, there were about four dozen container stacks left to go. The crew starts work before dawn and ends about 2-3pm. Oddly, yesterday the dismantling crew left at 10am, so I didn't get many pictures of that part of the work.
This is the view from near Coronado Peak just at dawn.
It's hard to tell when they'll be done, but for sure sometime this coming week. Good riddance.
Just got word that tomorrow really is likely the last day of the #ContainerWall. I'm so tired today. The thought of a 4-hour drive tonight, camping in my truck in the cold and then flying my drone at dawn is...exhausting. But, I've come this far, so I might as well carry on one more day, right?
To paraphrase Darth Vader, "The sunk cost fallacy is strong in this one."
In the meantime, here are two close ups of a container wall worker. I'm only going to use one. Which do you prefer? Poll —>
Which of the two shots of a worker reaching for chains in the previous post do you like best? I'm only going to use one in the story.
Click to expand photos to see complete shot!
Here's a photo of the hydraulic oil leak from #ContainerWall contractor AshBritt's excavator used to move the containers. You can see it blasting out near the top of the arm and pouring off the bottom and puddling on the ground.
Local enviro groups are demanding that the Forest Service investigate and ensure the company does a thorough hazmat cleanup. (Because you know they won't otherwise.)
I've passed the spill info on to local environmental groups who will report it tomorrow. The workers made no effort to contain or clean up the spill, letting the oil soak into the ground instead.
If they get a big fine, it will be sweet justice for them being such jerks about being photographed today. Accountability bites.
I don't fault them for the accident. I fault them for not cleaning it up immediately. Instead they sent their crew home for the day.
One of the last containers heads to the staging area where it will be loaded onto a flatbed trailer and hauled out. At this point, I don't know where they're going. The former container lot near Whetstone, AZ is mostly empty.
Note I'm in Mexico shooting this, just behind the barbed wire cattle fence. The "Normandy barrier" was built in the early 2000s. Protesters have vowed to stop any new walls through this area. Stay tuned.
The last ten stacks of containers along the #ContainerWall as of late morning yesterday, January 30th.
I just received word this evening (Jan 31st) that the last containers were removed today, ending the saga of the container border wall. At least in Arizona.
Texas has since used the tactic along the border near El Paso. The insanity never stops.
The entire Arizona-Mexico border is amazing. Enchanting!
I never thought of it as a labor of love. More like a...compulsion? "Well, someone has to do it, right?"
I will be so damn glad when I don't have to do the 8-hour r/t drive or the even longer drive through Mexico + long cross-country hikes to get there anymore.
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