Protestors ground Stansted flights
Monday 8th December 2008, 8:36AM GMT.
An environmental protest has grounded all flights departing from Stansted airport.
Flights were due to begin at 06:10 GMT, but a group of demonstrators from the Plane Stupid group begun a protest – entering a secure area near the runway – earlier this morning.
Four arrests have been made by police, while authorities are now in the process of removing the remaining members on the ground – numbering up to 50 – who are presently chained together.
Inbound flights are being diverted.
In a statement on the group’s website Plane Stupid said: “The group intends to maintain its blockade for as long as possible, preventing the release of thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere.”
The group hopes to prevent departures from the airport, with a hope of slowing the “monumental” impact of climate change.
In response a statement from Stansted Airport explained: “At approximately 03:00 an unknown number of individuals breached security, but shortly afterwards were held by police. This continues to be the situation.
“Due to this event the runway is closed and will continue to be so until further notice.
“The advice to passengers is to contact their airlines directly who can advise them, but we are expecting delays.”
BAA has recently been given permission to expand operations at Stansted.
Plans are now being finalised to increase passenger numbers from 25 million to 35 million a year at Stansted, with the number of flights leaving the airport increasing from 241,000 to 264,000 a year.
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Let’s hope that these hysterical layabouts are severely punished for preventing people from going about their lawful business, and costing hundreds of thousands of pounds to our already hard-pressed industries.
UK air travel contributes a tiny amount to global carbon output. And what do these malcontents contribute to our economy? Very little I would suggest.
Many will be either benefit claimants or students who complain about their subsidised loans and how employers aren’t falling over themselves to give them highly-paid jobs regardless of the relevance of their degrees to the world of work.
There’s room for legitimate protest in the world, no matter how exaggerated or ill-informed the protestors, but this went well beyond what was lawful, and should be dealt with accordingly.
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They could have certainly protested in a place that was not so critical to airline operations. The TV news indicated that a young lady was prevented from attending her fathers funeral because of delayed flights etc.
Why didn’t they protest in the car park or some other place. Nasty lot.
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Bang em up for 5 years or better still chain them to the airport fence for a few days! might knock some sense into them!
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where will they be going on holiday next?
i bet it not Barmouth.
also tell me they walked to the airport?
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Lock them up for 10 years
We need to show misbehaving yobs how to behave even if they hide behind the flag of enviromental issues
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Peter, who regularly denies the reality of anthropogenic climate change on these threads, called these young protesters ‘ill-informed’.
I disagree with him.
And I find it staggering that Peter finds it so hard to see the obvious contradiction between Labour government rhetoric on cutting greenhouse gas emissions and actual Labour government policies on expanding aviation.
Let’s have a look at some of the facts surrounding this issue.
1) Aviation represents the world’s fastest growing source of carbon dioxide emissions.
2) Burning aircraft fuel has a “RADIATIVE FORCING RATIO” of around 2.7; which means that the total warming effect of aircraft emissions is 2.7 times greater than the effect of the carbon dioxide alone.
3) The UK CANNOT cut its CO2 emissions while doubling the numbers of people flying by 2030 (government projections)
4) 160,000 premature deaths worldwide are ALREADY attributable to climate change every year (World Health Organisation).
5) 854 million people worldwide ALREADY do not have enough to eat (FAO) and their prospects will be immensely worsened if runaway climate change takes effect (WHO)
6) The Arctic region is warming at a faster rate than the rest of the world at least a decade before it was predicted to happen. (US National Snow and Ice Data Centre, reported in Independent, Tues 17th December 2008)
On their website, Plane Stupid activists justified their actions thus:
‘We did so with heavy hearts, knowing it would disrupt passengers, because we knew the consequences of this action couldn’t be worse than the consequences of inaction. If irreversible climate change kicks in, millions of lives will be destroyed.’
It seems to me that not only are these protesters well-informed, but that they have a global conscience to match their understanding of the world.
Martin Luther King said, ‘Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter’.
Peter denies man-made climate change even exists.
So I, for one, am glad that the protesters were not silent.
The government’s hypocrisy on airport expansion matters and Plane Stupid were right to bring it to the world’s attention.
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