LONGVIEW, Wash. (AP) — Hundreds of Longshore workers stormed the Port of Longview, overpowered security guards, damaged rail cars and dumped grain at the center of a labor dispute that also stopped work at four other ports on Thursday, officials said.
Six guards were detained for a couple of hours after at least 500 Longshoremen broke down gates about 4:30 a.m. and smashed windows in the guard shack, said Longview Police Chief Jim Duscha. He called the detained guards "hostages."
No one was hurt, and nobody has been arrested. Most of the protesters returned to their union hall after cutting brake lines and spilling grain from a car at the EGT terminal, Duscha said. They also pushed a private security vehicle into a ditch.
A court hearing was scheduled for Thursday afternoon in Tacoma, in which a judge was expected to consider whether the actions by the union violated a previous restraining order.
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union believes it has the right to work at the facility, but the company has hired a contractor that's staffing a workforce of laborers from another union, the Portland-based Operating Engineers Local 701. Representatives of the engineers union did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
In Seattle, Tacoma, Everett and Anacortes, hundreds of Longshore workers failed to show up or walked off the job Thursday in apparent solidarity with the Longview activists, halting work at those ports. Union leaders said they had not called for any such actions.
"It appears the members have taken action on their own," said ILWU spokesman Craig Merrilees from union headquarters in San Francisco.
He said some workers maight have been motivated by a photograph circulating on the Internet of ILWU President Bob McElrath in police custody in Longview. Police arrested 19 protesters as they blocked railroad tracks on Wednesday night.
The protesters in Longview have portrayed themselves as being on the front line in the struggle for jobs and benefits among American workers in an economic downturn. But while union strife has flared up around the country — most notably in Wisconsin — the aggressive tactics seen in Longview have been a rarity in recent labor disputes.
Labor activists insist that after receiving tax breaks and promising to create well-paying jobs at the new $200 million terminal, EGT initially tried to staff the terminal with nonunion workers. Following a series of protests by the Longshore workers this year, the company announced it would hire a contractor staffed by workers from a different union.
"Today, the ILWU took its criminal activity against EGT to an appalling level, including engaging in assault and significant property destruction," the company's chief executive, Larry Clarke, said in a written statement. "This type of violent attack at the export terminal has been condemned by a federal court, and we fully support prosecution of this criminal behavior to the fullest extent under the law."
Police from several agencies in southwest Washington, the Washington State Patrol and Burlington Northern Santa Fe responded to the violence to secure the scene that followed a demonstration Wednesday.
One sergeant was threatened with baseball bats and retreated, Duscha said. "One officer with hundreds of Longshoremen? He used the better part of discretion."
The train was the first grain shipment to arrive at Longview. It arrived Wednesday night after police arrested 19 demonstrators who tried to block the tracks. They were led by McEllrath, who said they would return.
The blockade appeared to defy a federal restraining order issued last week against the union after it was accused of assaults and death threats.
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Associated Press writers Donna Gordon Blankinship and Doug Esser in Seattle contributed to this report.
Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.
