Greenpeace Activists Occupy BP Oil Vessel for Second Day

Greenpeace activists occupied an unmanned oil company vessel in the Arctic Ocean for a second day Tuesday in a protest against the company’s offshore oil development in Alaska.

The environmental group said five activists were on a vessel holding a BP Amoco control center and staff living quarters being towed to a construction site for the Northstar oil project in Prudhoe Bay, the site of Alaska’s largest oil field.

BP officials steered the vessel off course toward Barrow, Alaska’s northernmost town, where local police were expected to remove the activists. It will then set sail for its original destination, officials said.

“We’ve encouraged police to take sufficient time to plan this in a way that it can occur safely,” said Ronnie Chappell, spokesman for BP Exploration Alaska Inc.

Greenpeace plans to remain on the vessel to protest the Northstar project, spokeswomen said. It says the oil field will worsen global warming and threatens the Arctic ecosystem.

“We are going to stay here in BP’s control module as long as we can, campaigning from the Northstar nerve center to get BP to cancel the project and stop speeding up the meltdown of the Arctic,” said Stephanie Tunmore, one of the demonstrators.

The activists spent the night in the living quarters, using plastic covers on the mattresses.

The boarding is the latest in a series of high-profile Greenpeace actions in Arctic Alaska. This spring, protesters spent about eight weeks camped out on ice near Northstar as part of the campaign.

Northstar extends up to six miles offshore and has expected crude oil production of 176 million barrels.