Category: Climate Chaos

On the anniversary of the imprisonment of the Rossport Five, Shell’s peat stripping continues

Bel­lan­aboy, Fri­day June 29th 2007

In Erris, protests con­tin­ue every day at the site of the pro­posed refin­ery at Bel­lan­aboy, Coun­ty Mayo.

Rossport imprisonment 2nd anniversaryBel­lan­aboy, Fri­day June 29th 2007

In Erris, protests con­tin­ue every day at the site of the pro­posed refin­ery at Bel­lan­aboy, Coun­ty Mayo.

Last Fri­day, June 29th, was the sec­ond anniver­sary of the impris­on­ment of the Ross­port Five. The day saw the con­tin­u­ing of the oper­a­tion to strip the sur­face peat away from the Bel­lan­aboy refin­ery site, and as is now nor­mal, local peo­ple protest­ing were joined by sup­port­ers of the Shell to Sea cam­paign from oth­er parts of Ire­land and abroad.

As usu­al, the Gar­da response to the protests was bru­tal. One pro­test­er was arrest­ed and many more were assault­ed. Gar­daí also threw activists into the deep ditch­es near the Bel­lan­aboy site.

Videos of the protests on Fri­day morn­ing can be seen here: http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=kAXKHu3_bKo

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=tSMF4GgnC_I

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=u7jnUOq8LYA

or check www.youtube.ie/shelltohell

The Gar­daí were said to be sur­prised at the num­ber of pro­test­ers at the site on Fri­day morn­ing, while many peo­ple present com­plained that the police were suf­fer­ing from the effects of the night before. Pro­test­ers com­ment­ed on the notice­able smell of alco­hol com­ing from a lot of the offi­cers, and their gen­er­al­ly dishev­elled appear­ance, as well as their aggres­sive and juve­nile behav­iour. One gar­da, when con­front­ed with the fact that his behav­iour was not accept­able, loud­ly declared “I’m allowed to drink when I’m off duty!”.

Many peo­ple are still angry with the Gar­daí over their treat­ment of a local landown­er whose prop­er­ty they tres­passed onto to allow Shel­l’s con­trac­tors to install a secu­ri­ty cab­in near the pier at Pol­lo­tomais, across the estu­ary from Ross­port. The por­ta­cab­in has recent­ly been removed by Shell, but not before legal action had to be threat­ened.

Many local peo­ple accuse the Gar­daí of intim­i­da­tion of the elder­ly landown­er, putting him under such stress that he had to be admit­ted to hos­pi­tal. His fam­i­ly have said that he has been upset by a series of inci­dents includ­ing vis­its by up to six gar­daí to the house. Offi­cers asked him ques­tions and video-taped the respons­es. How­ev­er, the Gar­daí have denied there was any pres­sure or intim­i­da­tion involved.

Over the last few months thou­sands of tons of sur­face peat have been removed from the refin­ery site at Bel­lan­aboy and dumped 11KM away, in advance of the Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency deci­sion on whether the refin­ery will receive a licence to oper­ate.

New min­is­ter with respon­si­bil­i­ty for the scheme, Eamon Ryan, has been asked for a meet­ing with local peo­ple and oth­er sup­port­ers of Shell to Sea, but so far has not respond­ed. In the com­ing weeks and months, it is expect­ed that more peo­ple from out­side the area will join the protests.

One of the Ross­port Five, Micheál Ó Seigh­in said recent­ly:
“We wel­come peo­ple tak­ing non-vio­lent direc­tion to stop Shel­l’s scheme. This has nev­er been a pure­ly local issue. It has always had nation­al and inter­na­tion­al dimen­sions. Not only are peo­ple con­cerned enti­tled to protest, they are oblig­ed to stand up for what is right.
Relat­ed Link: http://www.youtube.ie/shelltohell

==============

The activist who was arrest­ed on Fri­day morn­ing was tak­en in hand­cuffs to Bell­mul­let Gar­da sta­tion where he was detained for four hours before being charged with var­i­ous pub­lic order offences, includ­ing that he “did with­out law­ful author­i­ty or rea­son­able excuse, wil­ful­ly pre­vent or inter­rupt the free pas­sage of a vehi­cle…”.

See also : A Taint­ed Process http://www.indymedia.ie/article/83016, Pros­e­cut­ing the Gar­daí http://www.indymedia.ie/article/83096, Court Report http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82730, Por­ta­cab­in inci­dent http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82983,

manchester bike stuff this weekend — critical mass, bike polo, summer party, critical commute, climate carnival

We cycle round the city to cel­e­brate the bicy­cle:

It’s for any­one that rides a bike;
Its a cel­e­bra­tion of get­ting round the city with­out pol­lut­ing it;
Its about every jour­ney being an adven­ture instead of just sit­ting on a bor­ing bus or in a stress­ful car;
Its about cyclists rid­ing togeth­er to demand more respect from oth­er road users;
Its a way to meet oth­er cyclis­tas;

We cycle round the city to cel­e­brate the bicy­cle:

It’s for any­one that rides a bike;
Its a cel­e­bra­tion of get­ting round the city with­out pol­lut­ing it;
Its about every jour­ney being an adven­ture instead of just sit­ting on a bor­ing bus or in a stress­ful car;
Its about cyclists rid­ing togeth­er to demand more respect from oth­er road users;
Its a way to meet oth­er cyclis­tas;

man­ches­ter crit­i­cal mass meet every last fri­day 6pm cen­tral library

woooo it will not only be an amz­ing bike ride to cel­e­brate the bicy­cle, to meet oth­er cyclists, to have an excuse to ride around, to feel part of a bike gang, to have a fun evening etc etc

but!

this month we will also be hav­ing an ace bbq with the bike soundsystem..woo a nice out­door bicy­cle sum­mer party.ace.

woo. so please bring veg­an stuff to put on it and things to drink! we will be quite near shops so if you dont its easy to get stuff.

last month we had around 120 cyclists on crit­i­cal mass, lets make this one even big­ger!

see http://www.myspace.com/mcrcriticalmass

Sat­ur­day 2pm bike polo prac­tise, platt fields park on the clay pitch behind the bas­ket­ball courts. every­one wel­come to join in!

see http://www.myspace.com/mcrdropouts

ALSO:

don’t for­get that it’s Crit­i­cal Com­mute this Fri­day morn­ing.

Details of start­ing points and times at

http://www.manchesterfoe.org.uk/lyb/critical.php

AND:

Cycling Con­tin­gent

sat­ur­day 30th June 4 Cli­mate Change Car­ni­val

[Man­ches­ter]

There will be a parade with sam­ba band and kids enter­tain­ment and speak­ers to talk about Cli­mate Change.

Starts at 1pm from Peace Gar­dens (between St. Paul Square (Man­ches­ter Cen­tral Library) and Pic­cadil­ly Gar­dens.

mcrcriticalmass@yahoo.co.uk
http://velorution.x21.org.uk

West London residents halt traffic outside DfT Headquarters

20.06.2007
West Lon­don res­i­dents protest­ing about plans to expand Heathrow dra­mat­i­cal­ly stopped traf­fic this morn­ing out­side the Depart­ment for Trans­port (DfT) offices in Cen­tral Lon­don before attempt­ing an inva­sion of the build­ing.

Heathrow DfT protest 1
Heathrow DfT protest 2Heathrow DfT protest 3Heathrow DfT protest 4Heathrow DfT protest 520.06.2007
West Lon­don res­i­dents protest­ing about plans to expand Heathrow dra­mat­i­cal­ly stopped traf­fic this morn­ing out­side the Depart­ment for Trans­port (DfT) offices in Cen­tral Lon­don before attempt­ing an inva­sion of the build­ing.

The pro­tes­tors car­ried a bed along Mar­sham Street from the flat of BAA Chief Exec­u­tive Stephen Nel­son (1) to the Depart­ment for Trans­port. In the bed were two fig­ures sym­bol­is­ing the close rela­tion­ship between BAA and the DfT under the slo­gan “DfT in bed with BAA”.

As they crossed Mar­sham Street a dozen res­i­dents halt­ed the traf­fic when they paint­ed a run­way on the road. The res­i­dents, assist­ed by the direct action net­work Plane Stu­pid, then left the bed out­side the DfT offices.

The action fol­lows the rev­e­la­tion last week that the Depart­ment for Trans­port had secret­ly passed key infor­ma­tion sup­port­ing expan­sion of Heathrow to BAA six months before it is due to be pub­lished (2).

Ear­li­er in the year, on March 5th, West Lon­don res­i­dents invad­ed Chatham House and dis­rupt­ed a speech by Trans­port Sec­re­tary Dou­glas Alexan­der.

Long-time West Lon­don res­i­dent Dr John Hunt and mem­ber of the Green Par­ty said, “This action is to expose the unhealth­ily close rela­tion­ship there is between BAA Fer­rovial and the Depart­ment for Trans­port. While BAA and the Depart­ment plot and plan the expan­sion of Heathrow, res­i­dents and local author­i­ties are left in the dark”.

Mag­gie Thor­burn, a long-time West Lon­don res­i­dent, said, “Although I live under the flight path and am affect­ed by the noise of the planes, I took part in today’s action not just because of the increased noise lev­els I would expe­ri­ence if expan­sion went ahead, but also because I firm­ly believe that any fur­ther expan­sion at Heathrow should be ruled out on cli­mate change grounds.”

ENDS

Notes for Edi­tors:

(1). BAA owns a flat for its Chief Exec­u­tive (Flat 905, St Johns, Mar­sham St) about 60 yards from the Depart­ment for Trans­port head­quar­ters at 76 Mar­sham St.

(2). Ear­li­er this month (6th June) the Times www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1890224.ece revealed that “The Depart­ment for Trans­port has secret­ly passed key infor­ma­tion sup­port­ing the expan­sion to the Span­ish-owned com­pa­ny six months before it is due to be pub­lished in a con­sul­ta­tion doc­u­ment. The depart­ment has also allowed senior BAA offi­cials to influ­ence a series of tests designed to show whether the third run­way would breach lim­its on air pol­lu­tion and noise. The Times has learnt that BAA has a team of 34 peo­ple work­ing with civ­il ser­vants, influ­enc­ing the tests so that they find in favour of build­ing the new run­way. The depart­ment has giv­en BAA a full copy of the pre­lim­i­nary results but is refus­ing to allow any oppo­nents of the expan­sion to see them. Mike Forster, BAA’s head of strat­e­gy for Heathrow, admit­ted at a recent con­fer­ence that he had seen the results and that they were “encour­ag­ing”.” The full report is not expect­ed to be made pub­licly avail­able until just before a con­sul­ta­tion into plans to expand Heathrow, expect­ed in the autumn.

Greenpeace gives away free train tickets at airports across the UK

19 June 2007.

UPDATE (9.25am): The booths have now all been moved by secu­ri­ty.

Over the past hour or so, impromp­tu tick­et exchange booths have been appear­ing in air­ports across the UK.

Climate ticket exchange @ airport19 June 2007.

UPDATE (9.25am): The booths have now all been moved by secu­ri­ty.

Over the past hour or so, impromp­tu tick­et exchange booths have been appear­ing in air­ports across the UK.

Green­peace vol­un­teers (fetch­ing­ly dressed as stew­ards and stew­ardess­es — pics here) have been offer­ing BA pas­sen­gers check­ing into domes­tic flights cli­mate-friend­ly train tick­ets.

It’s not just because we’re gen­er­ous souls — it’s also because fly­ing caus­es 10 times more dam­age to the cli­mate than tak­ing the train. And it’s respon­si­ble for 13 per cent of the UK’s impact on the cli­mate (that’s the gov­ern­men­t’s own fig­ures).

It’s also the fastest grow­ing source of emis­sions in the UK; between 1990 and 2050, emis­sions from avi­a­tion could quadru­ple, which sci­en­tists say could wipe out all oth­er emis­sions sav­ings we make in every oth­er sec­tor.

The main cause of this mas­sive growth in the UK is the pro­lif­er­a­tion of short haul flights — often unnec­es­sary domes­tic ones like the 30 or so a day between Lon­don and Man­ches­ter.

British Air­ways (despite its claims to be green) is one of the worst offend­ers, open­ing new and unnec­es­sary domes­tic routes, fierce­ly oppos­ing any mea­sures that will curb growth in emis­sions, keep­ing a tight hold over gov­ern­ment pol­i­cy and lob­by­ing hard for air­port expan­sion.

You can find out more about avi­a­tion and cli­mate change here.

And you can email BA’s Chief Exec­u­tive, Willie Walsh, ask­ing him to ground unnec­es­sary domes­tic UK flights on routes that are already well served by trains, and to end BA’s lob­by­ing for more run­ways and big­ger air­ports.

Brecon anti-pipeline camp eviction has begun (& updates Tues/Wed, press releases…)

19th June 2007
Bre­con tree camp evic­tion has begun. Sup­port need­ed!

Brecon pipeline camp eviction19th June 2007
Bre­con tree camp evic­tion has begun. Sup­port need­ed!

The evic­tion will most like­ly last a few hours, if you can make it, it would be a great help!

Site phone: 07733190958

===============
IF U CAN GET THERE TAKE A CAMERA, THE EVICTION TEAM IS GOOD OLD NET FROM SWANSEA

===============
update

11:40am

A40 has been closed.

There has been at least one arrest.

================
PRESS RELEASE

THIS MORNING THE EVICTION OF THE BRECON CLIMATE CHANGE CAMP AT PEN PONT BRECON IS GOING ON. THE ROAD HAS BEEN CLOSED BETWEEN SENNY BRIDGE AND BRECON FOR THE EVICTION TO TAKE PLACE. PEOPLE ARE ENTRENCHED IN THE CAMP. TREE HOUSES WILL HAVE TO BE EVICTED BY SPECIALIST CLIMBERS AND TUNNELS BY CAVE SPECIALIST

WE URGE ANYONE WHO CAN TO GET TO BRECON TO PROTECT THE PECEFUL PROTESTORS WHO ARE REFUSING TO MOVE VOLUNTARILY DUE TO THE MASSIVE ENVIRONMENTAL DESTRUCTION THE 48″ PIPELINE FROM MILFORD HAVEN TO TIRLEY IN GLOUCESTERSHIRE IS CAUSING.

THE RIVERS IN BRECON ARE RUNNING AS RED AS BLOOD DUE TO THE SILTING UP OF THE RIVERS WITH THE RED BRECON SOIL. SEE FOR YOURSELVES THE MASSIVE ENVIRONMENTAL CATASTROIPHE THESE PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO STOP.

NO FOSSIL FUELS..

TELEPHONE

01639 632286

07790 727 250

================
No Embar­go
**
*Pipeline pro­test­ers refuse to climb down as evic­tion starts*

Pro­tes­tors have refused to climb down from trees on the route of the
con­tro­ver­sial high pres­sure methane gas
(LNG) pipeline in Wales after being giv­en a 10 minute warn­ing by bailiffs to
leave the site or face being arrest­ed.

Pro­tes­tors have locked them­selves togeth­er high up in the trees using
bicy­cle D locks while oth­ers have gone down into the tun­nels they dug with
food to last for sev­er­al days in order to delay Nation­al Grids mul­ti­mil­lion
pound destruc­tive and dan­ger­ous project.

One pro­tes­tor has today said “We are will­ing to risk arrest as the
con­se­quences of this pipeline will be far more dev­as­tat­ing than spend­ing a
night in a police cell. Nation­al Grid, as a pri­vate com­pa­ny, are putting
share­hold­er prof­it before peo­ples safte­ty, both local­ly and more
glob­al­ly. We are putting our­selves in the way to say this is com­plete­ly
unac­cept­able.”

Anoth­er pro­tes­tor, from Bris­tol Ris­ing Tide said “The Gov­ern­ment, Nation­al
Grid Plc and oth­er Cor­po­ra­tions are con­tin­u­ing to build and prof­it from
fos­sil fuel infra­struc­ture despite the clear fact that to pre­vent
cat­a­stroph­ic cli­mate chaos, car­bon emis­sions must be cut by 90% by 2030. So
it is up to peo­ple to take respon­si­bil­i­ty and take
action and that is why I am here doing what I can to stop this being built.”

The road from Bre­con to Sen­ny­bridge, which runs past the camp, has been
closed by the police.

Con­tact:
Bris­tol Ris­ing Tide: 07917 383517

*Notes to Edi­tor*

Ris­ing Tide is a cli­mate action net­work ded­i­cat­ed to chal­leng­ing the root
caus­es of cli­mate change — the fos­sil fuel growth based econ­o­my. Ris­ing Tide
argues that cli­mate chaos is an issue of social injus­tice and that the
poor­est will suf­fer most.

This pipeline, 4ft in diam­e­ter, will run at 94bar pres­sure – that is
96kg/cm2. Nation­al Grid have no expe­ri­ence of run­ning pipelines at such high
pres­sure and it is unprece­dent­ed in Europe and the US.

In 1999, a fam­i­ly of four were killed in Scot­land when a high pres­sure gas
pipe explod­ed by their home. Mas­sive cor­ro­sion in the pipeline, and a
fail­ure on the part of Nation­al Grid/Transco (NG/T) to keep ade­quate records
on what kind of pipes were being used, led to the explo­sion. Cor­ro­sion has
already been seen on the welds in the South Wales pipeline.

Since pri­vati­sa­tion, NG/T have shed thou­sands of engi­neer­ing jobs and cut
main­te­nance work. In 2000 it was revealed that Transco had under­spent its
agreed pipeline main­te­nance and replace­ment pro­gramme
by £358m over the pre­vi­ous two years. This same cor­po­ra­tion, account­able to
only its share­hold­ers and board, is now sup­pos­ed­ly respon­si­ble for the
safe­ty of thou­sands of peo­ple along the route of
this pipe.

300 Con­struc­tion work­ers at the Drag­on LNMG ter­mi­nal were recent­ly on strike
over safe­ty con­cerns on site. One work­ers was hos­pi­talised and work­ers were
demand­ing safer work­ing con­di­tions.

================

bre­con evic­tion update! 14:14

The Evic­tion con­tin­ues with two arrests on the ground and peo­ple locked on in the tree tops, there are also peo­ple under­ground with sub­stan­tial sup­plies! please sup­port these peo­ple by donat­ing towards fines etc on the “fight the pipe” web­site.

if any­one can make it they need the sup­port!

peace love and fuck the pipe, nation­al grid, nation­al evic­tion team and any­one else involved XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

================

Evic­tion update…
16:49

There has now been at least 5 arrests, we have no idea who has been arrest­ed yet as they are being kept on site at the moment. There are still peo­ple locked-on in trees.

The A40 has now been re-opened but is down to one lane.

RESPECT & LOVE to all those who will be arrest­ed over this.

FUCK YOUR PIPE NATIONAL GRID, FUCK THE GOVERNMENT FOR LETTING THIS STUPID PROJECT HAPPEN, FUCK THE POLICE & EVICTION TEAM.

We stand proud and strong know­ing we are defend­ing our beau­ti­ful earth that oth­ers want to destroy in the name of mon­ey.

================

Lat­est news from the evic­tion.…
22:36

There have so far been 6 arrests made. One per­son has had no fur­ther action tak­en against him, two peo­ple have been cau­tioned, two peo­ple have to appear in court tomor­row in Llan­drindod at 9.30am to face a charge of obstruct­ing a bailiff in his line of duty, one per­son is still at the police sta­tion.

Three peo­ple are still left at the tree camp. The bailiffs have gone home for the night and will resume evic­tion in the morn­ing. Two of the remain­ing pro­test­ers are in a tree-house and one is just sat in a tree with an umbrel­la. There is police and secu­ri­ty guard­ing the site.

All the pro­test­ers belong­ings have been tak­en off site and they have a month to claim what is theirs.

PLEASE GET TO COURT IN LLANDRINDOD TOMORROW FOR 9.30am TO SHOW SUPPORT!!

================

WEDNESDAY UPDATE DIRECT FROM TREE HOUSE AT BRECON

20.06.2007 12:19
JUST SPOKEN TO THE LAST TWO PEOPLE IN TREE HOUSE!

THERE ARE STILL TWO PEOPLE IN A TREE HOUSE IN BRECON THEY HAVE ASKED ME TO PASS ON THE FOLLOWING: THEY HAVE HAD NO FOOD OR WATER FOR THE LAST 24HRS AND NO KIND OF LIASON OFFICER HAS BEEN PRESENT, THE TUNNEL WAS TAKEN FIRST THING THIS MORNING AND ONE FEMALE WAS REMOVED FROM THE TREES. ALL THE TREE HOUSES HAVE BEEN DISMANTLED AND THE TWO REMAINING DONT THINK THEY HAVE LONG TO GO! (FAIR PLAY)

I TRAVELLED TO THE SITE LAST NIGHT AND I COULD NOT EVEN GET WITHIN 400 YRDS OF THE SITE, THE POLICE WERE BASTARDS AND THREATENED TO ARREST ME SEVERAL TIMES FOR BEING IN THE AREA, THE AMOUNT OF SECURITY WAS OVERWELLMING THERE WERE AROUND 150 ANGRY POLICE, 200 SECURITY GUARDS AND BAILLIFFS ALL OVER THE PLACE ALL NIGHT! (I HAVENT SEEN SUCH SECURITY MEASURES SINCE NEWBURY)

THE REASON PEOPLE CAN NOT FIND MUCH ON THE NET IS BECAUSE YOU CANT GET NEAR THE PLACE, PLEASE CUT AND PASTE THIS EVERYWHERE AS INFO ON THE EVICTION IS HARD TO FIND.

PEACE LOVE AND ROTTEN CABBAGE TO THOSE INVOLVED IN THE EVICTION!

Undead support campaign against Spanish oil multinational

Last Thurs­day 14th June in Asturias, North­ern Spain I was present at an action where a Zom­bie Col­lec­tive came back from the dead to sup­port La Cam­pana Asturi­ana e Con­tra el Expo­lio de las Petrol­eras and oth­er Span­ish sol­i­dar­i­ty organ­i­sa­tions by stag­ing a series of die-ins in a garage fore­court and else­where around the city of Gijon.

Last Thurs­day 14th June in Asturias, North­ern Spain I was present at an action where a Zom­bie Col­lec­tive came back from the dead to sup­port La Cam­pana Asturi­ana e Con­tra el Expo­lio de las Petrol­eras and oth­er Span­ish sol­i­dar­i­ty organ­i­sa­tions by stag­ing a series of die-ins in a garage fore­court and else­where around the city of Gijon.

The action was to draw atten­tion to the actions of Span­ish based oil mul­ti-nation­al Rep­sol who are respon­si­ble for pop­u­la­tion dis­place­ment, mil­i­ta­riza­tion, vio­lence and mur­der in sev­er­al South Amer­i­can coun­tries, most notably Colom­bia, where they oper­ate clan­des­tine­ly.
Pub­lic­i­ty at the action told of El Tri­bunal Per­ma­nente de los Pueb­los (Per­ma­nent Tri­bune of the Peo­ple) that is described as an inter­na­tion­al organ­i­sa­tion, look­ing for truth, jus­tice and repa­ra­tion for the vic­tims of oil com­pa­nies Rep­sol, British Petro­le­um and Occi­den­tal Petro­le­um in Colom­bia. It oper­ates out­side offi­cial judi­cial struc­tures of any coun­try and rep­re­sents the eth­i­cal con­science of the peo­ple and human­i­ty. The TPP is hold­ing a judge­ment on these com­pa­nies in Bogo­ta in August this year. There is also a pre­lim­i­nary meet­ing to this in Madrid in June.

One of the Zom­bies said:
“ We are here in sol­i­dar­i­ty with all those who have died as a result of Repsol’s actions in Colom­bia. We are also here because we wish to make you, the Liv­ing aware of how so many of the organ­i­sa­tions, insti­tu­tions and sys­tems that you cling to are in fact corpses them­selves. From the Oth­er Side we have a clear­er pic­ture than you and we see that though you trick your­selves into believ­ing oth­er­wise, your courts, your gov­ern­ments, your busi­ness­es in so many cas­es serve only Death. You cling to them because you are afraid to let go and allow new sys­tems that can tru­ly serve you and Life to grow. Always some­thing has to die for the new to be born. Many of you hold a new world in your hearts but it can­not be born while you hold on to the rot­ting corpse of the old. Let it go, grieve it if you must but its time is past and it serves you no longer.”

I asked for clar­i­fi­ca­tion but the undead com­pan­era declined to elab­o­rate. Per­haps she was refer­ring to social move­ments where peo­ple seem to be mov­ing away from try­ing to change the behav­iour of gov­ern­ments to learn­ing how to gov­ern them­selves and build the world they want.…?

Relat­ed Link: http://www.repsolmata.ourproject.org

Climate activists glued to doors at airport

16.06.2007

Cli­mate cam­paign­ers this after­noon glued them­selves to the doors of the short-haul East Mid­lands air­port to draw atten­tion to the envi­ron­men­tal impacts of fly­ing as part of a Euro­pean day of action on short-haul flights called by pres­sure group Air­port Watch.

East Midlands Airport glue action 116.06.2007

Cli­mate cam­paign­ers this after­noon glued them­selves to the doors of the short-haul East Mid­lands air­port to draw atten­tion to the envi­ron­men­tal impacts of fly­ing as part of a Euro­pean day of action on short-haul flights called by pres­sure group Air­port Watch.

Two men from cli­mate action group, Plane Stu­pid, have caused dis­rup­tion by super­glu­ing them­selves to the pas­sen­ger entrances to the air­port. Sup­port­ers are there hand­ing out leaflets to air­port cus­tomers encour­ag­ing them not to fly next time, and a ban­ner car­ried by heli­um-filled bal­loons was also been released in the depar­ture lounge bear­ing the slo­gan ‘Let’s fry’.

Last week anoth­er activist from Plane Stu­pid, Pen­ny East­wood, a moth­er of two from York­shire, glued her­self both to the doors of Lastminute.com HQ in Lon­don in protest at the ever grow­ing green­house gas emis­sions from avi­a­tion.

Today’s day of action was called to illus­trate that short-haul flights are unnec­es­sary and unsus­tain­able and that short haul jour­neys can eas­i­ly be tak­en by train or bus which are both over ten times less pol­lut­ing. Demon­stra­tions and protests have been hap­pen­ing through­out the day at air­ports across the UK and Europe, includ­ing Heathrow, Gatwick, Bris­tol, Southamp­ton, Edin­burgh, Aberdeen, Paris, Brus­sels, Ams­ter­dam and oth­ers.

Avi­a­tion is the fastest-grow­ing source of green­house-gas emis­sions world­wide. In the UK, emis­sions from avi­a­tion more than dou­bled in ten years. In May the gov­ern­ment quot­ed the fig­ure of 13% as aviation’s con­tri­bu­tion to UK cli­mate impacts. If you include flights to and from the UK by UK cit­i­zens (the gov­ern­ment excludes the for­mer), the sec­tor now con­tributes about 18.5% of the cli­mate-chang­ing emis­sions for which this coun­try is respon­si­ble.

Not­ting­ham pro­tes­tor, Alex Har­vey, said, “Binge-fly­ing is chok­ing the plan­et. Air­port expan­sion would lock us into increased green­house gas emis­sions and undo all our oth­er efforts to reduce emis­sions. It’s just not an option. Yet that’s exact­ly what is planned for air­ports like East Mid­lands which only serve des­ti­na­tions eas­i­ly reach­able by more sus­tain­able pub­lic trans­port alter­na­tives.’

Last year twen­ty-five activists from Plane Stu­pid block­ad­ed a taxi-run­way at the same air­port.

- ENDS -

nottingham@planestupid.com
http://www.planestupid.com
East Midlands Airport glue leaflet 1
East Midlands Airport glue leaflet 2
For more pho­tos of passers­by, reac­tions etc, see https://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/06/373813.html and https://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/06/373834.html

Climate Mass: Bristol Temple Meads to Bristol International Airport for 16 June aviation action day

Sat­ur­day 16 June — 2nd Euro­pean Day Of Action On Avi­a­tion — a bike ride from Bris­tol Tem­ple Meads to Bris­tol Inter­na­tion­al Air­port.

Stop Bris­tol Air­port Expan­sion will be join­ing many oth­er groups around the UK and across Europe in protest­ing against air­port expan­sion, with par­tic­u­lar empha­sis on short-haul flights. We will be focus­ing on a theme of ‘trains not planes’ with a bike ride from Bris­tol Tem­ple Meads to Bris­tol Inter­na­tion­al Air­port.

Sat­ur­day 16 June — 2nd Euro­pean Day Of Action On Avi­a­tion — a bike ride from Bris­tol Tem­ple Meads to Bris­tol Inter­na­tion­al Air­port.

Stop Bris­tol Air­port Expan­sion will be join­ing many oth­er groups around the UK and across Europe in protest­ing against air­port expan­sion, with par­tic­u­lar empha­sis on short-haul flights. We will be focus­ing on a theme of ‘trains not planes’ with a bike ride from Bris­tol Tem­ple Meads to Bris­tol Inter­na­tion­al Air­port.

So we’re call­ing on expe­ri­enced cyclists to join Stop­BI­Ae in mak­ing thi­er point. Stop­BI­Ae have planned a route that will take you through Ash­ton to Long Ash­ton and then to the A38 via Bar­row Gur­ney. Because the route is par­tial­ly down the A38.

There will be a pho­to oppor­tu­ni­ty for the press at each end: at Tem­ple Meads we will be empha­sis­ing the point that Gov­ern­ment is focus­ing on air­port expan­sion and large­ly ignor­ing the rail net­work — yet Tem­ple Meads urgent­ly needs new sig­nalling to improve its capac­i­ty (we may be joined by some rail cam­paign­ers); at the BIA end we will be arrang­ing a visu­al illus­tra­tion of the theme — to be revealed on the day!

After that we hope to pic­nic on Fel­ton Com­mon close to the air­port. A free lunch will be pro­vid­ed for all cyclists and we hope non-cycling SBAE sup­port­ers will join us with a pic­nic. Fel­ton Vil­lage Hall, which is next to the Com­mon and has bath­room facil­i­ties, will be avail­able in case of bad weath­er.

It would be very use­ful if you could let Stop­BIA know a few days in advance if you can join the ride so we have an idea of the num­bers to expect. If you can help with organ­is­ing or on the day please get in touch too! You can con­tact us by email­ing Stop­BI­Ae — http://www.nobristolairportexpansion.co.uk/aboutthecoalition.html

Full details of the cycle route will be avail­able clos­er to 16 June.

If you have anoth­er meet­ing you would like us to men­tion here please email email Stop­BI­Ae — http://www.nobristolairportexpansion.co.uk/aboutthecoalition.html

http://www.nobristolairportexpansion.co.uk/

BILSTON GLEN 5TH BIRTHDAY PARTY

Bil­ston Glen 5th Birth­day Par­ty and Sun­day Free Cafe, on 24th June
Day time: Free food, work­shops, film show­ings, acoustic jam­ming


Evening: Sound sys­tem and par­ty. Also jam­ming and chill out space at the main fire-pit

Bil­ston Glen 5th Birth­day Par­ty and Sun­day Free Cafe, on 24th June
Day time: Free food, work­shops, film show­ings, acoustic jam­ming


Evening: Sound sys­tem and par­ty. Also jam­ming and chill out space at the main fire-pit


So come on down to the woods, if you haven’t been before, this is the PERFECT oppor­tu­ni­ty to get involved.
For more info and how to get there see our

home page

and our

myspace


Thousands strip off for London’s Naked Bike Ride + Manchester video + Brighton + York

In 2004 there were 58 rid­ers, in 2005 a cred­itable 250 rid­ers, ris­ing to a mas­sive 800 in 2006.

In 2004 there were 58 rid­ers, in 2005 a cred­itable 250 rid­ers, ris­ing to a mas­sive 800 in 2006.

But in a scale that sur­prised even the organ­is­ers, more than five thou­sand peo­ple today took to Lon­don’s streets to protest against oil depen­den­cy, cel­e­brate body free­dom and curb car cul­ture.

Start­ing from Hyde Park, there was a slight devi­a­tion in route as pre­cau­tions were tak­en to avoid a col­li­sion with an Orange march (fea­tur­ing as scary a bunch of appar­ent loons and psy­chopaths as you’d ever not want to meet).

Halt­ed half way down Pic­cadil­ly the scale of the ride became appar­ent, as it still tailed back well into Hyde Park (first pic­ture).

Part of the fun took it straight through the heart of Lon­don’s tourist hell­hole, Covent Gar­den. But the roar of appre­ci­a­tion from the crowds made the cob­bly streets more than tol­er­a­ble.

Why so many? Well many of the rid­ers had been to last mon­th’s Crit­i­cal Mass, swollen to record num­bers as a result of State attempts to con­trol it and make it “ille­gal”. Empow­ered, as many put it, the next stage was to get their clothes off and take it up a lev­el.

“Roll on” as Rik­ki put in his report of that day “the next piece of repres­sive leg­is­la­tion”.

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Man­ches­ter 2007 WNBR evening Fri­day 8th:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEuDP7BOBUc

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Brighton 07 World Naked Bike Ride
On Sat­ur­day, more than 200 naked cyclists rode through Brighton and Hove in East Sus­sex. “Bikes and naked bod­ies harm nobody. Car fumes… are dri­ving us all to cli­mate chaos.”

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York: