Vandalism or Terrorism

There is a brief article over at KRQE.com about recent vandalism against a number of gas wells in New Mexico over the last six weeks. It seems that someone has been shooting high-powered rifles at gas well heads and storage tanks. It’s a brief article without much in the way of details other than it appears that local authorities are investigating this as nothing more than vandalism.

It sounds like this may be nothing more than a couple of red-necks looking to see explosions (always fun in the mind of most good-ole boys that I know). The fact that an IED was detonated near (but not at) one of the gas wells does support this idea to some extent. While it remains a possibility that someone is trying to attack these well sites for political ends, the lack of any claim of attack or manifesto for political change makes it unlikely that this is a terrorist attack.

Gas wells have been targets of local eco-terrorists in Canada and TSA has noted threats against pipelines. Anytime that there are attacks against these types of facilities one must consider the possibility that the attacks are terror related. I hope that the local authorities are keeping this in mind as they continue their investigations.