by Michael Smith
Essex, December 2008: When environmental activists of the “Plane Stupid” campaign occupied the runway on Monday, December 8, 2008, at Stanstead airport what were they trying to achieve?
They wanted to draw attention to the fact that our flying is releasing lots of CO2 into the atmosphere and make us understand that another runway at Stanstead and more and more airport extensions is not good for the environment. But what did they do while doing so? They were culpable in releasing additional tons of CO2 and other pollution into the air. Instead of making things better, for that day they made things worse.
Why? Because their action forced the airport authorities to reroute plane to other airports, often quite a distance away. This put additional tons and tons of CO2 from those aircraft and other pollution into the atmosphere, So, instead of doing the environment good they did the opposite.
According to a spokesperson of the activists they wanted to draw, as I said, attention to the fact that our love affair with flying and ever bigger airports is releasing CO2 into the atmosphere and the fact that this airport expansion and further expansion of air travel is damaging the environment. In their action, they themselves, however, did damage to the environment. It would appear that it is a case of “the means justify the methods”. They do not.
Apparently Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, and other environmental organizations have commended and applauded the acts of those activists and have said that more of such actions are going to come in the future.
I am afraid to say that I consider this the wrong approach and one that will make the environmental movement, yet again, look bad in the eyes of the public. Firstly, should the laws really be broken in such a manner to highlight the problems. I do not think so, though I know that I may be in the minority here.
Actions such as this, and other acts of lawbreaking, does not help the image of the movement; not one bit.
What those actions did highlight, however, and that more than likely to the embarrassment of the airport authorities and the government, is that the air side areas of our airports are wide open, basically, to all kinds of terrorists and to me this is worrying. Thanks guys and girls for showing this, yet again.
I do agree with the protesters on their main point, however, namely that we are causing great damage to the environment with our love affair with the aircraft and air travel and also with the ever expanding airports.
However, we must attack government here and not the airports themselves and not the travelers. As long as it is cheaper to fly to New York one way than is a return ticket to Birmingham from London in peak time then we are on the wrong track – no pun intended.
Only if and when government finally is prepared to step in and sort out this joke about train fares will we ever have a more environmentally friendly transport possibility. As long as plane travel is going to be cheaper than the railroads then we have a problem.
I don't care about the idea of a high-speed rail link to Timbuktu or even Birmingham as long as I know I can get there in an hour or so in a reliable way. I do not have to be there in 35 minutes. All I want, and I am sure the same is true for most people, is to have a reliable railroad service that can get me there in say an hour or so from London at a price of below £50. It does not make sense when the railroad information quotes me £225 return and an airline can do the same from Gatwick to Birmingham International for £64 return first class (sorry, we have no seats available in business class for that flight). Business class quote was £49 return. Sorry, but this does not compute.
So, I can very well understand the protesters as to the airport expansion, which is NOT what we need, but this is NOT the way to go about it. While some may think that it is it is not. Then again some want to be martyrs to the environmental cause. I guess they like their names all over the place and on police records too. There are other ways, ways that are much more effective than getting a criminal record.
Let's face it; in some countries doing what they have done would get one killed. There snipers protect the airport secure zones and lethal force is authorized. Good for them it is not, as yet, in the UK. The more, however, protesters, break into airports, the closer we are going top be getting to snipers on roofs, of that I am certain.
For some of those protesters the getting into the media, I am sure, is a lure. The cause is secondary to many. Am I a cynic? Well, yes, I am. But I have also encountered enough protests to know. Yes, there are many genuine people who do a protest – outside the perimeter, for instance , as did the women of Greenham Common who protested against the US nuclear missiles that were based there in the days of the Cold War – but there are also many who use the “direct action” as a way of hitting at the establishment and as a way of making a little name for themselves.
The Greenham Common women made sense to me, lots of sense in fact. One of the reason that, even though I was with the US military at the time, I took the time to see them and talk with them (they did not know what I was but I know they guessed). The battle dress and the black beret though without badge was a dead giveaway I guess. It was, however, a very enlightening visit.
Occupying an airport area and chaining oneself to whatever to me is not a useful protest. It is a publicity stunt and nothing more.
I can understand this in regards to attempting to prevent, say, a woodland being destroyed and stopping bulldozers and such that way, at least for a moment, but on an airport this, to me at least, doe not make sense.
Trying to highlight the fact that flying releases tons of CO2 while adding to the CO2 load due to causing planes to be diverted to airports miles and miles away and then the additional CO2 released by the passengers having to get to where they really need to get to and want to get to by taxi and such. I guess they have never looked at it that way.
© M Smith (Veshengro), December 2008
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Environmental activist occupy runway at Stanstead
