MY 80-YEAR-OLD mother lives near the summit of Lempster Mountain, in the shadow of the proposed wind turbine power plant. Much has been made of the not in my backyard attitude of opponents of large industrial wind turbine power plants. I would like to briefly discuss a few of the reasons why some of us, and perhaps the reader, would not want to have one of these power plants in our back yard.

The machines to be used on Lempster Mountain are two-megawatt capacity turbines manufactured by the Spanish corporation Gamesa. When completed, the structures will be taller than a 30 story office building, reaching some 400 feet from the ground to the tip of the seven-ton blades’ uppermost reach. The weight of the structure, turbine, gearbox and blades mounted some 300 feet above ground is approximately 40 tons.

When spinning, the velocity of the blade tip reaches more than 150 miles an hour. Ice forms on the blades during winter, flying off of the blade tips at top velocity in blocks as big as a man and weighing up to hundreds of pounds.

Tall wind turbines of this capacity are subject to lightning strikes, as evidenced by the shattered turbine blade experienced at the nearby Searsburg, Vt., facility earlier this year. On Lempster Mountain, the 400 foot tall structures will be mounted on and near the summit of the highest point of land in town and a spot already well known for spectacular lightning displays. The blades used on the Gamesa turbines are made with carbon fibers. Carbon fibers are the material used in Edison’s first light bulb, they are excellent electrical conductors.

In their wisdom, the decision-makers at Community Energy Inc, the developer of this power plant, are locating these lightning rods within 400 feet of one residence, and within 1,000 to 1,500 feet of some 40 other homes and homesites. Failed turbine blade projectiles from Gamesa turbines have been known to travel some 3,300 feet before impact, just far enough to reach the bedroom of my mother’s home on Lempster Mountain.

Dozens of people have already been killed by accidents at wind turbine power plants. Cut in two by flying blocks of ice, burned alive by explosion and fire, slaughtered in so called “industrial accidents.” I have provided names, dates and places to this paper for verification.

The death machines about to be constructed on Lempster Mountain should concern us all. To wildlife lovers, Reuters reported recently that wind turbines are wiping out the last vibrant eagle population in Norway. New Hampshire’s dozen nesting pairs of bald eagles are at risk.

Since Lempster has no zoning laws and is unable to block this project, New Hampshire’s Site Evaluation Committee (SEC) is the last remaining public body with the authority to assume jurisdiction and assure that this power plant installation is done in a safe and legal manner, if it is to be done at all. Facing death on Lempster Mountain, my mother and her friends and neighbors strongly urge the site evaluation committee to do so.

Rick Webb runs R.D. Webb Company, a maker of furnaces for research laboratories, in Natick, Mass.