Tag: Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas

Activists sue Texas commission for allowing SpaceX to use its Superheavy deluge launch system

9:45 am

The same activist groups that have repeatedly used lawfare to try to block SpaceX’s operations at Boca Chica have now sued the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) for allowing SpaceX to use its deluge launch system during Starship/Superheavy launches, claiming that dumping potable drinking water into the ground somehow damages the environment.

The groups — the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, along with the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas, and Save RGV — filed the lawsuit Monday after the agency decided last month to allow SpaceX to continue its operations for 300 days or until the company obtained the appropriate permit.

These three groups represent only a very tiny handful of people in the Rio Grande Valley. The people the media interviews from Save RGV always includes the same persons, suggesting that few people in south Texas support it. The “Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas” in turn is a fake Indian tribe. It no longer exists, and when it did it existed in Mexico, not Texas. Finally, the “South Texas Environmental Justice Network” is simply an umbrella organization created on top of other two to make it appear they have more support than they do.

The real question that local journalists should be asking is where are these groups getting their money for all their lawsuits? I suspect it comes from outside the region, from leftist political organizations whose goals have nothing to do with the environment.

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SpaceX scraps its land swap offer to Texas

10:11 am

SpaceX has decided to scrap its land swap offer to Texas, whereby the company would have given the state 477 acres of wildlife land it owns elsewhere in exchange for ownership of 43 acres of state park land adjacent to its Boca Chica facility.

In a Sept. 26 letter seen by Bloomberg News, SpaceX Vice President Sheila McCorkle told the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department that the company “is no longer interested in pursuing the specific arrangement.”

In exchange for SpaceX getting the 43 acres, the company would have given the state some 477 acres of its land near Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, around 10 miles away. The land could have given Texans access for hiking, camping and other recreational purposes, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission said. In March, the commission approved the deal.

Environmental activists worry their fight’s not over with SpaceX and Musk, who has achieved newfound political power through his close ties to President-elect Donald Trump. “We’re concerned that he has something bigger and more disruptive to the beach and to the wildlife in mind,” Bekah Hinojosa, a representative from the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, an advocacy group, said in an interview. [emphasis mine]

The blind opposition of these leftist activists to Musk and anything he does has merely caused them to cut off their nose to spite their face. SpaceX’s proposal would have given the public a much larger wildlife area that was also far enough away from Boca Chica to allow its use all the time. Now the state is stuck with 43 acres of state park land that is going to be useless whenever Starship/Superheavy launches.

The lawsuits against this swap claimed it violated the Texas constitution. My guess is that SpaceX decided it wasn’t worth fighting this battle. Or maybe it is now playing hardball in negotiations. These activists do not have the support of the local community, which wants SpaceX’s operations to be successful. By scrapping the plan now SpaceX might be acting to force the Texas legislature to change the law to make the land swap legally acceptable.

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Activists file lawsuit to prevent land swap at Boca Chica

2:51 pm

The same collection of activists who have been waging lawfare against SpaceX’s Boca Chica rocket facility have now filed a new lawsuit, this time against the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission (TPWD) in order to block an approved land swap that gives SpaceX 43 acres of a Boca Chica state park in exchange for receiving 477 acres nearby.

The South Texas Environmental Justice Network, the Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas, and Save RGV banded together for a lawsuit filed in the District Court of Travis County on April 3. The suit alleges that Texas Parks and Wildlife violated statutory requirements for the proposal, including the requirement to consider alternatives to giving away public park land; the requirement to ensure the minimization of harm to the public park land; and the requirement to consider the best interests of the local community and TPWD.

These jokers represent very few people in south Texas. Worse, the so-called “Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas” was in Mexico, not Texas, when it existed. The corporation that exists now is a front for filing these lawsuits, taking advantage of the numerous DEI regulations that now exist to favor such minorities.

That the commission approved the swap unanimously, despite heavy pressure from these groups, illustrates the larger support in Texas for what SpaceX is doing. Expect the Texas courts to endorse that support as well. All these suits will do is delay, delay, delay.

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Texas state court rules in favor of activist lawsuit against SpaceX

9:00 am

The activists who sued SpaceX and local authorities, claiming the beach closures required during tests and launches at Boca Chica violate the Texas constitution, have had their lawsuit reinstated by a higher state court after a lower court had dismissed it.

Texas’ 13th district court of appeals ruled in favor of SaveRGV, the Sierra Club and the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas in suits alleging that a 2013 state law allowing beach closures for space flight activities goes against the Open Beaches Amendment to the Texas Constitution.

In July 2022, Cameron County’s 445th District Court dismissed the coalition’s lawsuit, saying the organizations lacked standing in their complaint against Texas Land Commissioner Dr. Dawn Buckingham, the Texas Land Office, Cameron County and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

The appeals court reversed that decision Thursday, allowing the lawsuit to proceed.

The lawsuit still must be litigated, so these activists have not yet won their case. However, this decision might prevent further beach closures while the case plays out in the courts, which would essentially shut down any further tests or launches at Boca Chica. If so, it will not matter if the FAA finally finishes its paperwork and approves a third test launch of Starship/Superheavy later this month. The launch will not be possible.

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Environmental groups file another complaint attempting to stop SpaceX launches at Boca Chica

3:45 pm

In what is now becoming a routine process of harassment, several environmental groups have filed another complaint against the FAA and Fish & Wildlife for eventually issuing a second launch license to SpaceX, permitting it to do its mid-November second orbital test launch of its Starship/Superheavy rocket from Boca Chica, Texas.

In the supplemental complaint, the groups — Center for Biological Diversity, American Bird Conservancy, Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas, Inc., Save RGV and Surfrider Foundation — allege the FAA failed to properly analyze the environmental impacts of the first Starship launch before issuing a revised license for the second launch that took place Nov. 18.

That new licensing process included an environmental review by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) regarding a pad deluge system that SpaceX installed on the pad to prevent damage like that the pad suffered during the first launch. The FWS concluded that the deluge system would produce no significant environmental changes.

The environmental groups argue that both FAA and FWS fell short of what was required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to review the environmental impacts of Starship launches. The FAA, it stated in the complaint, “once again failed to take the requisite ‘hard look’ at the impacts of the Starship/Superheavy launch program through a supplemental NEPA analysis.”

Let me translate what this complaint really says, and I can do it only a few words: “Your review didn’t come to the conclusions we want — which is to block all work by SpaceX — so that we can do what we want!” Both the American Bird Conservancy and the Surfrider Foundation simply want unlimited access to the region for their own recreation, while the Center of Biological Diversity is only interested in stopping all human development anywhere — until it can settle its frequent lawsuits against the government and pocket its payoff.

As for Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas and Save RGV, both are bogus organizations. The first is for a almost non-existent Indian tribe that never even lived in this area (they were based in Mexico), and the second claims it represents the people of the south Texas region who want SpaceX’s work stopped. Since almost everyone in Brownsville and throughout the region is celebrating the new prosperity brought to them by SpaceX, it is essentially a front group for the Marxist environmental movement that hates all prosperity. It doesn’t represent anyone really in south Texas.

As before, this complaint will have to be fought, wasting time and money.

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SpaceX files to join FAA as defendant in lawsuit trying to shut down Boca Chica

9:01 am

SpaceX on May 19, 2023 submitted a motion to become a defendant in the lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) and others that demands its Starship/Superheavy launchsite at Boca Chica be shut down.

“SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy launch program hinges on the FAA’s review and licensing decision challenged here. If the Court were to rule in Plaintiffs’ favor, the FAA’s decision could be set aside, and further licensing of the Starship/Super Heavy Program could be significantly delayed, causing severe injury to SpaceX’s business,” the company said in the motion, which was filed on May 19.

The full motion can be read here [pdf].

SpaceX’s motion notes that it has followed all government regulations in the decade since it established its Boca Chica launch site, and invested more than $3 billion in doing so. The motion points out that “the FAA does not adequately represent SpaceX’s interests” and that the company must participate because the lawsuit will have direct financial impact on its business.

In other words, the big guns are now being hauled out against this lawsuit, which on its face is somewhat weak. We shall see if it can withstand the much more aggressive fight that SpaceX is certain to put up.

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Environmentalists sue FAA, demanding it shut down Boca Chica and Starship

12:10 pm

Starship/Superheavy at T+4:02, just after the self-destruct command was issued
Starship/Superheavy at T+4:02, just after the self-destruct command
was issued on April 20, 2023. It also appears to be the fate of SpaceX’s
entire Boca Chica operation, if the environmental radicals get their way.

A group of environmental groups as well as a non-profit corporation calling itself the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas, Inc, today filed a lawsuit against the Federal Aviation Administration FAA), demanding it shut down SpaceX’s Boca Chica facility and block all further Superheavy/Starship launches.

You can read the lawsuit here [pdf]. Its essence is contained in these two paragraphs:

The area surrounding the SpaceX facility at Boca Chica is a biologically diverse and essential habitat area for many species, including federally protected wildlife and animals that are considered sacred to the Carrizo/Comecrudo People, such as the critically endangered ocelot. The SpaceX facility is smack in the middle of publicly owned conservation, park, and recreation lands, including a National Wildlife Refuge, two State Parks, a State Wildlife Management Area, and a State Coastal Preserve. These lands are of extraordinary conservation value for a range of federally and state lists wildlife and other protected species such as migratory birds. Bird species from both the Central and Mississippi flyways converge there, making it an essential wintering and stopover area for migratory birds as they move north and south each year.

SpaceX activities authorized in the FONSI/ROD [the environmental reassessment issued last year] have and will adversely affect the surrounding wildlife habitat and communities. In addition to harm from construction activities and increased vehicle traffic, rocket launches result in intense heat, noise, and light pollution. Furthermore, the rocket launches and testing result in explosions which spread debris across surrounding habitat and cause brush/forest fires — including one that recently burned 68 acres of adjacent National Wildlife Refuge. The FAA calls these explosions “anomalies,” but in fact they occur frequently, with at least 8 over the past 5 years. FAA acknowledged that many more such “anomalies” are expected over the next 5 years. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has found that prior SpaceX rocket explosions harmed protected wildlife and designated habitat in violation of the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

In other words, rockets and launch sites should never be placed inside wildlife refuges, because such activity is detrimental to wildlife.

A more false statement cannot be made. Under this conclusion the launch facilities at Cape Canaveral, which have been operating in the middle of a wildlife refuge now for more than six decades, should be shut down immediately. All the wildlife there must certainly be dead!
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