Activists opposed to the expansion of London’s Heathrow Airport blocked an approach tunnel today by chaining themselves to a parked vehicle, sowing traffic chaos around Europe’s busiest airport.
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Demonstrators, apparently from the Plane Stupid campaign group, blockaded the airport’s inbound tunnel, preventing people from accessing Terminals One, Two and Three.
“In 2010 the High Court ruled third runway strategies “untenable in law and common sense” because they violated the Climate Change Act”.
At about 8.40am, a Scotland Yard spokesman said the protest was still continuing, despite officers making five arrests for “obstruction-related offences”.
“If air travel increase is not reduced, by 2037 air travel alone could emit all of the carbon it is safe for the United Kingdom to emit”.
In a statement on its website, Plane Stupid said: “The government needs to choose: build new runways or stop climate chaos”.
Local resident Neil Keveren, a builder whose village would be bulldozed for the third runway, was fined after blocking the same tunnel with his van on 2 July. They feel they have to.
“There’s already airport ability for families taking their annual vacation”. We have been forced to be disobedient just to be heard. New runways only benefit the 15% of flyers who take 70% of our flights, cooking our planet.
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“These are affluent regular leisure flyers”.
