climate protesters
Protesters in Massachusetts in a prior Dec.8 incident attempting to flag down a coal train to stop it. Image source: 350 New Hampshire Action via WBUR.
The "end of the world" apocalyptic hyper-gloom-and-doom rhetoric of Greta Thunberg and other self-anointed climate prophets are leading followers to take greater and greater risks in attempts at "staving off climate disaster" — increasingly endangering themselves and public safety.

As a case in point, climate activists in the northeast United States have for the past month been physically trying to halt coal-filled freight trains, in some cases by literally jumping on the tracks. As Fox News reports of the latest dangerous incident caught on video:
An environmental reporter in Massachusetts posted a video on Twitter late Monday that she said showed a freight train hauling coal being met with a group of climate change activists on a dark track.

The train was seen moving slowly through Worchester, Mass., and about a dozen activists with small lights could be seen surrounding the tracks. The train's horn was blaring, but the activists appeared to continue to give it chase. The train was headed to New Hampshire, the reporter wrote.

The clip was posted by Boston NPR-WBUR reporter Miriam Wasser, who also noted railway authorities had been alerted that people were on the tracks by a call to an emergency hotline, just prior to the chaotic scene.

Wasser wrote that the train bound for New Hampshire "nearly ran over a dozen climate activists" who had been attempting to block its passage. The video shows the slow-moving train blaring its horn constantly as flashlight bearing activists attempt to halt its movement by appearing to dart in front of it as well as run close alongside it. There were no reports of injuries in the aftermath, and the incident is apparently still being investigated.

The large freight train's movement doesn't appear to be stalled; however, it's well-known that at full speed multi-car trains can take up to a mile to mile-and-a-half to stop once emergency brakes are applied.

The ultra risky tactic of attempting to block trains in motion also presents the potentially deadly scenario of derailment or danger to the engineers conducting the train. A statement from one activist group alleged to be involved in the latest incident confirmed the train didn't stop:
An after-hours email from Fox News to the group was not immediately returned. 350 New Hampshire, an activist group in the state, wrote that no one was hurt, but the train "refused to stop."
It's not the first such incident and appears part of a greater trend, as earlier this month the Boston Globe identified that a group called the Climate Disobedience Center is engaged in a broader campaign to halt coal transfer based on the claim that coal power plants "pollutes the river and causes asthma and contributed to climate change."


A group called 350 New Hampshire Action also admitted to being engaged in a campaign to disrupt trains in the region: "It is crucial that the actions that we take not be one-off actions," a spokesperson for the activist group said. They vowed to "continue until the power plant is taken offline once and for all" — specifically in reference to Merrimack Station power plant in Bow, New Hampshire.

Crucially, the leaders and founders of 350 New Hampshire have been fierce vocal advocates for Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, whose own rhetoric on taking action has appeared to get more extreme as she grows in popularity.

greta angry
"We are in the beginning of a mass extinction. ... If you choose to fail us, I say we will never forgive you." Image source: AP.
An earlier report from a local NPR station said multiple arrests were made in the New England region earlier this month as the activists' tactics get more dangerously interventionist:
She and about 100 others joined the protest Sunday, delaying the train at three different points along its route - in Worcester and Ayer, Massachusetts, and in Hooksett.

About two dozen people were arrested on misdemeanor trespassing charges.
Fox News also noted freight tracks had been temporarily blocked at "various points" across New Hampshire, including Worcester, Ayer and Hooksett.

As such protest tactics inevitably get more and more radical and risky, we should also note the mainstream media's role in all of this. Consider some of the opening lines to a recent New Yorker piece: "The climate apocalypse is coming... If you're under thirty, you're all but guaranteed to witness it... you can accept that disaster is coming, and begin to rethink what it means...".

Now with the issue cast in such cult-like "good vs. evil" moral dualism, disaster is indeed on the horizon, but not in the way these 'activists' and media pundits think.