Massive convoys of test frack equipment arrive at West Newton

This is in fla­grant breach of 2 key Plan­ning Con­di­tions- they need to give 2 week’s writ­ten notice before activ­i­ties on site (Con­di­tion 2) and there must be no con­voys of vehi­cles, with at least 10 min­utes between vehi­cles. (In the Traf­fic Plan referred to in Con­di­tion 7)

There were mul­ti­ple large con­voys, totalling 64 vehi­cles. The well pad was extreme­ly crowd­ed with vehi­cles and equip­ment.

There was a very heavy police pres­ence with numer­ous vans and riot vans, around a hun­dred police through the vil­lages of New Eller­by, Mar­ton and West New­ton.
High Fos­ham road was closed to pedes­tri­ans and traf­fic.

West New­ton has had anti frack­ing Pro­tec­tors camp­ing at the site since May 9th. There is anoth­er camp at Rath­lin’s oth­er well site in East York­shire, Craw­ber­ry Hill.

Louise Cas­tro, a pro­tec­tor camp­ing at the site said, “It’s chaos and may­hem here- local vil­lagers were forced to trail across the fields just to see what was going on, and were dev­as­tat­ed- some burst in to tears when the scale of it hit home. Rath­lin have rid­den roughshod over the traf­fic plan worked worked out with the vil­lagers.”

Ian Crane, a for­mer oil exec­u­tive also liv­ing at the anti frack­ing camps said, “Today the locals got a taste of what is to come on a dai­ly basis if the uncon­ven­tion­al oil and gas indus­try is allowed to go ahead with frack­ing in this area”.

Pauline Hak­e­ny, a res­i­dent of near­by Skir­laugh said, “I’m real­ly shocked at the amount of vehi­cles- they promised us this would nev­er hap­pen- and also the amount of police- there were loads of vans and offi­cers in all the sur­round­ing vil­lages.”