Hi-Tech Advocacy in Action

“We put a flag at half staff marking the locations of all the mountains that have been eliminated, and people can go and see them for themselves and read stories of the mountains, and they can even submit their own stories,” Hitt says. “So it’s this online, interactive memorial.”

The Google Earth technology probably is the most helpful in the campaign’s effort to put the issue into perspective for visitors because of the scale of mountaintop removal, Hitt says. The only other way to show its effects to people is by taking supporters in an airplane, but that’s cost prohibitive and wouldn’t allow the message to reach nearly as many people.