MESSAGES:
An environmental group has taken credit for the fires. What do you think now?
VAIL, Colo. (AP) _ An environmental group has taken responsibility for a series of fires on Vail Mountain, transforming the blazes into what may be the costliest act of eco-terrorism in the nation's history.
The Earth Liberation Front, linked to arson incidents across the Northwest, said it torched the buildings and chairlifts to protest an expansion plan by the nation's busiest ski resort.
The group said it set the fires _ estimated to have caused $12 million in damage _ ``on behalf of the lynx.'' And it vowed to ``be back'' if Vail encroached on roadless land again.
``We are currently investigating the content, credibility and origin of this message,'' Eagle County sheriff's spokeswoman Kim Andree said Wednesday.
Seven separate fires, reported around 4 a.m. Monday, destroyed three buildings and damaged four chairlifts at the chic resort in the heart of the Colorado mountains, 100 miles west of Denver. The fires were set at night, above 11,000 feet in rugged terrain that was muddy and snow-covered.
Investigators so far have called the fires only suspicious and possibly arson. But Gov. Roy Romer and others immediately linked the fires to the resort's controversial expansion plan.
Last week, Vail cleared a key hurdle in its bid to become even larger when a federal judge dismissed a suit by environmentalists who said the 885-acre expansion could harm the planned reintroduction of lynx. Six days ago, crews began clearing trees and erecting fences.
Then came the fires, which were denounced by environmentalists involved in the fight against Vail. On Wednesday, the Earth Liberation Front sent an e-mail message to several media organizations:
``On behalf of the lynx, five buildings and four ski lifts at Vail were reduced to ashes on the night of Sunday, October 18th,'' it read. ``Vail Inc. is already the largest ski operation in North America and now wants to expand even further.''
The expansion ``will ruin the last, best lynx habitat in the state. Putting profits ahead of Colorado's wildlife will not be tolerated. ... We will be back if this greedy corporation continues to trespass into wild and unroaded areas,'' the group's message said.
The discrepancy in the actual damage and the damage claims was not explained. The buildings destroyed were the luxurious Two Elk Restaurant, a picnic building and a ski patrol headquarters.
The Earth Liberation Front, which has been linked to EarthFirst! and the Animal Liberation Front, last June claimed responsibility for spraying red paint on the Mexican Consulate in Boston in protest of the treatment of peasants in Chiapas, Mexico.
Since December, the ELF has taken at least partial responsibility for fires at U.S. Agriculture Department buildings in Olympia, Wash.; a fire at an Oregon corral used for wild horses and burros captured by the Bureau of Land Management; and the ``freeing'' of 310 animals from a Wisconsin fur farm.
Barry Clausen of North American Research, a Eureka, Calif., group that tracks eco-terrorism, said more than 1,500 eco-terrorism crimes have been documented in the past decade, including arson and bombings.
He said those kinds of crimes have escalated from six in 1986 to 300 a year the past two or three years.
``We are now seeing major acts of arson,'' he said, noting that the damage at Vail makes it one of the largest such crimes to date.
Ron Arnold, executive vice president of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise in Bellevue, Wash., which tracks eco-terrorism reports, went even further, saying that ``as far as dollar cost, it's head and shoulders above everything we know of.''
He said the most costly act of eco-terrorism _ loosely defined as a crime committed to save nature _ happened at the University of California, Davis. A 1987 fire, linked to the Animal Liberation Front, caused an estimated $5 million in damage at an animal research facility.
A spokeswoman for the Animal Liberation Front, Katie Fedor, said the ELF's claim of responsibility was genuine.
``It comes as no surprise they would take this action to save animals, in this case, the lynx,'' she said, adding that her group was not involved.
Spokespersons with the FBI and President Clinton's Council on Environmental Quality declined immediate comment.
In Vail, relations between local residents and the posh resort have soured in recent years as the company sought to expand into nearly every area of retail trade, from bars to hotels. Vail's takeover last year of Keystone and Breckenridge resorts in nearby Summit County created apprehension about an even bigger conglomerate. Then came the expansion, the subject of hot debate at local hearings.
The fire has thawed some of the hard feelings.
``There is an antagonism below the surface, but these fires have created a lot of sympathy for Vail Associates,'' said Town Manager Bob McLaurin. ``I think it's going to pull this community together.''
``For people to take matters into their own hands just because they don't agree with the decision is wrong,'' added City Councilman Kevin Foley. ``I spoke out against (the expansion) at the hearings but I'm not up there on the mountain with matches.''
MESSAGES:
An environmental group has taken credit for the fires. What do you think now?