Protester feels lucky despite 'bad omens'

Protester feels lucky despite 'bad omens'
By Stephanie Spellers
News-Sentinel staff writer

All in all, Stephen A. Smith would chalk this week up as a good one.
True, he was forced to land in a Brewton, Ala., cotton field Sunday afternoon when the rented plane he piloted ran out of fuel.
The next day he was selected to climb a crane in Mobile, Ala., as part of a protest against companies that export forest products internationally — only to be arrested and charged Tuesday with trespassing and disorderly conduct.
But Smith, 32, thinks he's been pretty lucky.
"On one level, there were all these bad omens — the horrible weather, the emergency landing," he said. "But we walked away from the plane, and the protest was a primo event."
Smith and two passengers — Mike Knapp of WUTK-AM 850 radio in Knoxville and Danielle Groitsch, a University of Tennessee law student — left Knoxville early Sunday afternoon on a flight to Gulf Shores, Ala.
Smith, one of the founders of the Foundation for Global Sustainability and the executive director of the Tennessee Valley Energy Reform Coalition, was set to meet a group protesting Kimberly-Clark and Chipco Inc., two companies that cut products from forests throughout the Southeast and ship them to Pacific Rim nations.
But Smith ran into stormy weather in Alabama and had to deviate from his flight plan. When he glanced at his gas gauge, Smith said, he realized he needed to refuel to reach Gulf Shores. He plotted a course to a small airport in Brewton.
Within moments, he knew something was wrong.
"It should have been easy to get to Brewton," he said. "We had an hour's worth of fuel, and it was only 10 minutes away. But the plane was using fuel at a much higher rate, and I had to make a choice."
He chose to land in Bill Scroggins' back yard.
"I was out in my yard shoveling chips into my truck around 4 p.m.," Scroggins said. "My dogs were barking, but I thought it was a deer. When I turned around, I said, 'Wow, there's an airplane.' "
Smith stalled the plane over Scroggins' field.
"Then it just dropped real hard, like a brick," Scroggins said.
Only the landing gear was damaged. Otherwise, the plane and its occupants were unharmed. Within a short time, the wayward travelers were back on schedule to meet protesters in Mobile.
Smith and four other men hung a banner that read "Stop Exporting Forests and Jobs" from a crane used to load wood chips onto a barge headed for Asia. As Smith expected, they were arrested and promptly released on bail.
"When you're doing this kind of work, you feel like you're doing the right stuff," Smith said. "I don't know if it's blessing or what it is. But it's work that's got to be done, and it won't be stopped."