Relentless Blockading of $hell’s Work

Novem­ber 29, 2011

In Erris, Co. Mayo the Tues­day morn­ing tra­di­tion­al gath­er­ing out­side the $hell refin­ery con­tin­ues despite increas­ing pres­ence of Gar­dai and rain.

$hell use the refin­ery as a hold­ing area for mate­ri­als, and it is also set on the haulage route between local quar­ries, the peat depo­si­tion site, and the com­pound at Augh­oose.

This morn­ing local res­i­dents and sup­port­ers from Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp were out in good num­bers, block­ing deliv­er­ies of stone and truck­loads of extract­ed peat through­out the morn­ing and giv­ing the Gar­dai a run for their dirty mon­ey. Regard­less of the odds one per­son rose to the chal­lenge, occu­py­ing a truck from Bar­ret­t’s quar­ry for two hours — all work at the com­pound then came to a halt.

The Gar­dai even­tu­al­ly brought in the ‘trans­porter’ to remove them, dur­ing which they also attempt­ed to pre­vent peo­ple film­ing the arrest.

In the face of the enor­mi­ty of $hel­l’s plans for Erris, the strug­gle con­tin­ues!
If you would like to join us for any amount of time see
www.rossportsolidaritycamp.org / www.shelltosea.com

——

Gardai and IRMS rendered powerless as campaigners blockade Shell’s compound

Decem­ber 2, 2011

Work was com­plete­ly halt­ed at Shell’s com­pound yes­ter­day for over five hours in a great show of resiliance by local cam­paign­ers and their sup­port­ers. For the past two weeks now, Shell have been attempt­ing to remove mass­es of peat from the com­pound in prepa­ra­tion for the tun­nel bor­ing machine which is expect­ed to arrive ear­ly next year. Progress has been con­tin­u­ous­ly dis­rupt­ed as pro­test­ers brave the win­ter weath­er to stop trucks and a deter­mined resis­tance is build­ing momen­tum.

A local cam­paign­er yes­ter­day wait­ed patient­ly out­side the main gate of Shell’s com­pound in his car and request­ed to see some­one in charge. For weeks now he has been try­ing to lodge com­plaints about pub­lic safe­ty and traf­fic issues gen­er­at­ed from the Augh­oose com­pound. His con­cerns have been to date ignored. Hav­ing con­tact­ed the Shell offices in Bel­mul­let and the refin­ery he was fur­ther direct­ed by staff to go and try lodge his com­plaints at the com­pound in Augh­oose where fol­low­ing a long wait his request remained unan­swered. Once again the seri­ous con­cerns of local peo­ple were ignored.

In the mean­time, pro­test­ers arrived to slow work down and were met with six gar­da vehi­cles and a dozen or more Gar­dai along with just as many IRMS secu­ri­ty. A trac­tor was pre­vent­ed from enter­ing the com­pound with equip­ment despite gar­dai push­ing and shov­ing pro­test­ers around the road. Once the cam­paign­ers asked the Gar­dai to full­fil their duty and arrest them for block­ing Shell vehi­cles the Gar­dai stepped back. It is obvi­ous that the state’s police force here in Mayo pre­fer to employ vio­lence against pro­test­ers where pos­si­ble. Civ­il dis­obe­di­ence in num­bers made them think again.

For the fol­low­ing 4 hours the gates remained shut, a long line of trucks and trac­tors turned off their engines and work ground to a halt as cam­paign­ers con­tin­ued to peace­ful­ly demon­strate. One local per­son was assault­ed by IRMS and after many requests the Gar­dai even­tu­al­ly took his com­plaint. No arrests were made in a high­ly spir­it­ed day. An Gar­da Siochana, who are sup­pos­ed­ly the guardians of the peace, can bla­tant­ly be seen to be guardians of cor­po­ra­tions and cor­rup­tion up here in Erris.

The strug­gle con­tin­ues. Be part of the resis­tance. All are wel­come to stay at our win­ter camp or come join us dur­ing our day of sol­i­dar­i­ty on Sat­ur­day, 10th of Decem­ber.