Thieves have struck twice inside two weeks along the A378 between Langport and Curry Rivel stealing long lengths of BT telephone cable to melt down for its valuable copper.

 The first theft was at the bottom of Sandpits Hill and then the criminals, emboldened by their earlier success, took cable either side of the previous theft from opposite ‘Rag Acre’ cottage  at Portfield to near the gate of Mildeney Place.  In the first theft 200 metres of underground cable was taken on the night of the May Bank Holiday and then 10 days later on Friday 13th the criminals struck again, this time stealing up to 500 metres in three different lengths.  Villagers in Curry Rivel, Drayton and Hambridge lost all telephone and Internet connections for several days, causing anger and disruption to people and local businesses.

After the first theft, up to twelve BT engineers spent the next three days replacing the cable before a nearly normal service was resumed on Thursday 5 May.  One of these engineers told the Curry Rivel News “Fortunately, until now, these sorts of thefts have been spasmodic in this area, although there was a similar one about a year ago near Exeter.  What makes these ones here unusual are the long lengths of cable stolen and the confidence of the criminals to return to the same area twice within days.  We have to get replacement cables from Yorkshire, as this sort of length is not held by us anywhere in southern England … The thieves are, I think, professional criminals, who do their homework and know what to take from where. This is organised crime; they know what they are doing and they clearly don’t think they will be caught.”

Showing the Curry Rivel News a piece of cable, the engineer said “You can see that the core cable is 6.6 cm (2½ inches) in diameter and encased in heavy duty rubber.  Inside there are 800 individual lines, made from copper wire, which are then encased in plastic. So that’s 800 reconnections that have to be made at each end of the cable, so 1600 in all first time round, but now with three lengths removed that will be 4,800 reconnections – a difficult and time consuming job. The thieves have probably used a disk cutter or steel saw to cut out the cable, before they then cut it into more manageable lengths of between 1½-2 metres….. The reason some houses in the village still have phone connection is because there are two cables and each time the thieves took the biggest one.”

Even a 1½ metre length of cable was heavy and two such lengths was about the maximum lift for one man.  So there would have been over 100 of these lengths for the thieves to load into their van or lorry following the first robbery and then around 500 lengths in the second.  Having removed the cable from the underground piping via access manhole covers on the footpath next to the A378, probably using some sort of van or small sized HGV, it is likely that the criminals then dragged it into a nearby field or lane, where they then cut up the lengths of cable and loaded it into their vehicle.

Last year BT recorded a 9% increase in the theft of copper wire like this, mostly the result of organised criminal gangs ripping up cables to be then melted down and sold overseas as scrap. The surge in global mineral prices has fuelled a boom in illegal scrap metal sales.  A spokesman for BT said “These criminals leave vulnerable people isolated, hamper access to the emergency services, isolate communities and cost us in BT huge sums to repair and replace.”

The village Postmaster, Alan Norton, said apologetically “Well, I can only sell stamps, as all other transactions through the Post Office are electronic and we have lost all our lines, although oddly the cash dispenser is still working.  The people I feel sorry for are those elderly residents who are reliant on ‘Careline’ personal alarms to summon help in case of an emergency.  For most of us, the loss of our telephone and Internet link is an inconvenience, but for them it could be life threatening.”

Both the ‘Local/NISA’ shop (the Shell garage) and ‘One Stop’ told the Curry Rivel News that they had lost their phones, whilst their card machines were either very slow or not accepting some debit/credit payment cards, which had caused frustration amongst customers.  Linda Underdown of ‘The Olde Forge’ said “We’ve had to divert calls to our mobile, but of course mobile coverage is not good here.  The loss of our landline and card machine is really annoying.  How can this happen twice in Curry Rivel within a fortnight?”

Avon & Somerset Constabulary said in a statement following the first robbery “We have conducted house-to-house enquiries and we have found some useful evidence at the site, which has been passed to our Rural Crime Team.”

Both thefts were well planned and executed.  They probably involved at least one vehicle and several men acting suspiciously during the hours of darkness in and around the area at the bottom of Sandpits Hill on the night of Monday/Tuesday 2/3 May and then again at Portfield in the early hours of Friday 13 May.  It is possible that the criminals were dressed like genuine BT engineers to divert suspicion.  If you saw or heard anything, or think that you may have information that will help the Police apprehend these criminals, phone 0845 456 7000 or ‘Crime Stoppers’ on 0800 555 111

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