Our Video of the Week is only about a minute long, but it says a lot.

Activists in Virginia have been fighting to keep fracking out of the George Washington National Forest only to have a train full of fracked Bakken oil derail and explode in Lynchburg, leaking crude oil into the James River, part of that crucial watershed.

This is not an isolated incident. Unfortunately it often takes a train or a well pad engulfed in flames to garner media attention, but from well casing failures and spills to truck accidents and pipeline explosions, this process is fatally flawed from start to finish.

The industry tries to limit the definition of fracking to what happens under the ground, but we know it’s a full cycle of exploitation, from onsite contamination to dangerous transportation and waste disposal consequences.

We can’t let the industry isolate these incidents and the communities they effect.

That’s why we feel compelled to show this devastating video of the week, to show that North Dakota and Lynchburg, Virginia aren’t far away when it comes to fracking.

Below is a great piece by Steve Horn for DeSmogBlog that not only connects the dots between Lynchburg and North Dakota, but also shows the connections to potential exports and the Keystone XL pipeline.

Explosive Virginia Train Carried Fracked Bakken Oil, Headed to Potential Export Facility (via Desmogblog)

Wed, 2014-04-30 21:55Steve Horn Platts confirmed CSX Corporation’s train that exploded in Lynchburg, Virginia was carrying sweet crude obtained via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale basin. CSX CEO Michael Ward…