Jason Momoa has said plans to build a telescope on Mauna Kea in Hawaii would destroy Hawaii’s "birth place".
The 40-year-old actor has joined protestors on the islands – where he is from – to campaign against the proposed plans to build the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) on a dormant volcano named Mauna Kea.
And Jason has now said Hawaiians believe the mountain is "the umbilical cord to Earth", and so allowing building work to take place on it would be impacting "the most sacred" part of Hawaii.
He said: "It’s kind of the umbilical cord to earth. You know, if you think about the Hawaiian islands, that’s the biggest mountain in the world, right? All the way up. So Mauna Kea is the most sacred. They call it the belly button, too. That’s like our birth place. You can imagine that in the middle of the ocean. That’s how our islands were formed. So how can that not be sacred?"
Whilst there are already telescopes on Mauna Kea, most of them are defunct and are smaller projects than the TMT.
Jason says he first heard about the planned telescope back in 2015, and he’s now determined to "bring awareness to the world".
He added to CNN: "It started in 2015, heard the news about it and you know, it’s, it’s my home. I’m Hawaiian. It’s my nationality. What’s happening over there was just not right. And I wanted to bring awareness to it. And I went over there to meet with everyone and from then on, it’s just been this constant as a devotion to bringing awareness to the world."
Meanwhile, the ‘Aquaman’ star previously took his two children – Lola, 12, and Nakoa-Wolf, 10, whom he has with his wife Lisa Bonet – out to Hawaii to partake in a peaceful protest.
He said whilst on the islands: "I just want to say that I’m thankful to the protectors and the stewards of this land, and we are not going anywhere."
Jason Momoa defends Hawaii’s ‘birth place’ amid telescope plans
