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Anchor strike on Line 5 builds pressure on deal to pull pipe from Straits

LANSING, MI (MPRN)--   The National Transportation Safety Board blames human error and equipment failures for an anchor strike that dented the Line 5 pipelines. 

Attorney General Dana Nessel says the report is evidence the twin pipelines needs to be removed from the Great Lakes.

The NTSB report says the vessel was short-staffed during the Easter weekend as a technical malfunction allowed an anchor to drag on the lakebed. It struck Line 5 and the pipelines were dented.

Kelly Rossman-McKinney is the attorney general’s communications director. She says the 2018 incident is further proof Line 5 needs to be shut down.

“We are really just an, I mean seriously, an anchor strike, a total unintended anchor strike, away from devastation in the Great Lakes,” she says.

An Enbridge spokesman says the company is standing by its proposal to replace a section of Line 5 and encase it in a tunnel under the lakebed.

Governor Whitmer says she wants a deal on the future of Line 5 by June 10th.