Two fathers in their 50s have occupied the rig at the Horse Hill oil site in Surrey this morning in protest at fossil extraction.
The men, both members of the climate group, Extinction Rebellion, reached a platform on the rig, 15m above the ground. They have hung banners saying Stop the Harm and No more oil. They are refusing to come down.
Extinction Rebellion said the men entered the site, near Gatwick Airport, at 3.45am and used an access ladder to climb the rig to a platform.
Police reportedly arrived at 10am.
This is the second protest at the site this week. On Monday (5 October 2020) members of the group deliberately delayed tankers on the way to the site in a “slow walking” protest.
The rig at Horse Hill, delivered 10 days ago, is being used as part of a workover to improve oil flows. The site operator, Horse Hill Developments was granted planning permission in September 2019 to extract oil for 20 years.
In a statement this morning, one of the activists, management consultant Lindsay Parking, 50, described operations at Horse Hill as “an act of colossal, short sighted stupidity”.
“I am here as a father to prove to myself and my children that we all have the power to challenges that which is wrong in the world.
“It simply requires clarity of thought and courage in action. Knowing that the world is burning and my children and all children will suffer, I cannot sit idly by.
“This small act will not reverse the carnage by itself, but it may add to the growing conviction among ordinary people that self-interest, avarice and destruction are not our natural condition.
“As a parent, at some point you come to the realisation that you must raise your children to be able to best navigate the world as they find it. You cannot protect them forever or create their environment as you would like it to be for them, just by wishing. We are all obliged to act to create the world we wish to see. This is about growing up.”
DrillOrDrop has invited a response to the protest from UK Oil & Gas plc, the owner of the site operator. A civil injunction prevents specified protests at Horse Hill.
Surrey Police said in a statement:
“We were made aware that two people had entered the drilling site at Horse Hill, Horley, earlier today (10 October).
“The site is on private property and as such, the responsibility for removing the two people sits with the owners of the site.
“We will deal with any offences which are disclosed to us once the people have been removed.”
Update
The two men came down from the rig at about 5pm.
Categories: Opposition, slider
DRILL OR DROP? 
Looks like UKOG were snoozing rather than working last night , made me smile to wake up to this news , could be a long weekend.
Security having a bit of a kip then zzzzzz ? 😂 this will be a long weekend without any work.
Sanderson screws up again !
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Let’s hope the judge imprisons them and stop this blatant floundering of the law.
Time for Sanderson to go!
Those who seek to support activities that destroy our planet will hopefully wake up one morning and realise the damage they do to the planet and the futures of their own families. Surrey County Council who awarded these drilling licences are complicit in this. How much damage do we have to do to our planet before you get on to the right side of the argument?
“Those who seek to support activities that destroy our planet”
Have you any idea what you are talking about? Do you know how big this planet is? Have you any idea of the amount of material needed to have any measurable impact on a planetary system? If some of you people could hear yourselves in the third person you would soon realise what utter rubbish you talk. Destroy a planet? Think it through, this isn’t an episode of Star Trek, it is reality.
Goodness knows what the comments and activism would have been around the time of the introduction of the wheel!
Ironic really. There would be the ancestors who would support the wheel to enable future travel to areas to protest.
Testingmax still utilising his/her plastic, supporting activities that he/she states destroys our planet. The right side of the argument? Nope, hypocrisy is not that.
Police, trial, guilty, record – great news for the two families. Used by ER to achieve nothing. Mind you ER could do with some publicity as they are fading into irrelevant obscurity.
Bit like #ukog then , disappearing up their own share price to a shower of confetti. As for the consequences , some things are worth it and of course the personal choice of whoever is taking the action. Maybe they care more for their children’s future than lining Sanderson’s pink trouser pockets, just a thought.
Yes Jono I agree, a bit like #ukog, both heading no where. The difference is that one encourages law breaking, the other presumably doesn’t.
Yes ER probably are fading into relative obscurity. . . .
XR however are here to stay. . . . .EXTINCTION IS FOREVER
* Correction: ‘is’. She is elderly so not unexpected .
Hmmm.
Wonder how keen employers will be to employ those with criminal records, with a surplus of unemployed to pick from?
Not to worry, there will be Universal Credit funded by those working.
Good job at 50 and 52 the “children” are possibly getting to a stage they can decide for themselves.
So you are saying what ? That you don’t agree with them so they shouldn’t do it ? Did you even stop to think that they might have their own businesses?
Oh, I did, Jono. Businesses have customers. DOH!
People do what they want to and should accept they make the decision and it is their responsibility, and whilst their children may reap some of the consequences they do not make the decision.
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So, what I am saying is stop using kids as an excuse for what you do. It is nonsensical as there is NO proof that kids will follow a defined path as they become adults. That is the belief of certain cults, but even there is shown to be fake.
Oh the hypocrisy!! The naysayers anti’s and nimbys, how you believe the medical, and the huge employment industry’s have achieved the might they have to the advancement of humanity! The naysayers, anti’s and nimby’s have got their head so far beyond the truth they really believe the BS.
I wonder how sustain your eco lives are, you guys are just as hypocritical to believe you are any better than the energy producers. People having achieved not a lot in their lives!
Whatever good fossil fuels have done is now being outweighed by the harm. It’s time to look to energy solutions that are more in tune with our need for survival … sheer naked self-interest should tell us that, if nothing else. Sending solidarity to the two fathers up the tower ✊✊✊
Yes, Deborah.
About time you handed in your plastic keyboard. It’s past good is being outweighed by the harm now.
Sending solidarity to those who use fossil fuels -without the hypocrisy.
10th October-first frost of the year in the south of England! Not quite as “burning” as some would make out. Trust the two fathers have now been placed in a nice warm cell.